Umm, business doesn't work that way

[Ghel]

I never got to meet him, but I'm told my father-in-law's ashes were dumped in the family's well. The same well that <a world-famous brand> spring water is pulled out of. So there's a little bit of my father-in-law's ashes in every bottle of that spring water, traveling all over the world.

[BookstoreEscapee]

I came across some notes my mom had made once; she wants a closed casket and balloons instead of flowers...

[Naaman]

I made my burial instructions very simple for my family to follow.

Harvest whatever organs are useful. Stick the rest of me in a cardboard box...

I'm similar up to here.

I want to be buried in the back garden with herbs or apple trees (Braeburn for preference) on top

[Seshat]

I want my partners to plan whatever they need for closure, then whatever my birthfamily needs for closure.

I'm an organ donor, but I would be surprised if the doctors actually USE anything of me!

So - harvest organs, then whatever they need. I won't be around to care, but I do care that THEY are okay.

[Aethian]

I'm opting for donation both for helping people to live and helping doctors to learn.

[MrsEclipse]

I told my mom I want to be served as the snacks at my funeral. She told me that that's not even legal. Another dream down the turlet.

[Aethian]

Depending on where your being presented....it's legal. *coughs lightly* But really I couldn't imagine eating a dead relative. I always told Mom if it was a choice between cannibalism and no meat... I would start mooing and eating grass.

[telecom_goddess]

That amount, 150, would only get a medium sized spray, no bleeding heart, no casket spray much less the two of them.

I read yesterday that Detroit and Los Angeles were having issues with huge piles of unclaimed corpses in the freezers at the medical examiners offices because families in this economy cannot even afford the $650 for a simple cremation for their loved ones and the counties are out of money for burials of the indigent. Makes me sad because what does that say about us as a society if we cannot even simply bury our dead. I'm not talking huge spectacles with masses of flowers and weeping relatives, but simple box and immediate family.

There's a lot more I feel like saying but I don't want to verge over into fratching territory.

I saw a documentary about those unclaimed dead once...it takes about 3 years to try and track down relatives/kin of any kind/instructions for a funeral etc. If they get nowhere with that they burn 'em up, let them sit for a year and then put all the boxes of ashes from that year in one grave marked with the year only, no names. Apparently that system is breaking down.

[XCashier]

DH and I both (jokingly) say to throw us in the burn pit with the rest of the trash. In actuality, we've both agreed on "cheapest way."

Same here, except hubby says, "Send me to Glory in a Glad bag!"

Seriously, funeral expenses are insane. Yes, I know there are loads of laws, rules and regulations the industry has to follow, but I sure don't want to bankrupt my family just to put my empty shell in a hole in the ground. There's got to be a saner way.

[Andara Bledin]

I'm of the opinion that if my body requires more space after I'm dead than it did before I died, something has gone seriously wrong.

I don't really care what they do with my body so long as I'm done with it first, just so long as they don't put me in a marked up grave. I don't need to claim some plot of land somewhere in the name of my death. Not my style at all.

^-.-^

[draftermatt]

My grandfather always said he wanted to be buried in a pine box down near the creek on his property.

Now obviously my grandmother couldn't do that.

However, she bought the most expensive casket, had the viewing at the Church instead of the Funeral home, full Knight's of Columbus honor guard (which may have been free since he was a member), etc.

Before she got dementia, while planning her arrangements she told me that she always regretted going all out for his funeral (which he wouldn't have wanted) but at the same time, she wished she would have done more...

As for me, burn me, donate me to science, hell if I care, I'm dead. Though I am an organ donor.