What to do with one's dead relatives?
The thrifty Coombes-family solution to cumbersome human remains
I come from a long, proud line of hoarders.
It’s not, like, reality TV bad. We’re not wading through knee-deep piles of newspapers and bags of garbage or anything. Everything is mostly clean, neat and tidy. Well. Until you open the cupboards, that is.
I’m definitely part of the problem. When we were cleaning out the family home for sale last year I found all my HSC notes (a grand total of seven pages), every single My Little Pony I’d ever bought (currently stabled in the storage unit) and V8 racing programs dating back to the early 2000s.
I am but one Coombes. Multiply this by five and you’ll see the scale of the problem.
Ultimately, I think we’re just a sentimental people. But the weirdest thing is that this sentimentality is haphazardly applied.
Old toys from a happy childhood? Priceless memories. Impossible to part with. Like discarding a loved one.
But – say – the actual human remains of my grandparents…?
Well. That’s another story. I’m not going to tell it, though.
A couple of years ago, my mother wrote about what we did with the ashes of my grandmother and grandfather. It’s one of my favourite pieces of writing ever.
It deserves to be read, so I’m going to share it with you today.
Take it away, Leonie Coombes.
SPIRITS AT DAWN
It’s 6pm, the sun is over the yardarm and I’m off to have a G and T with my mum and dad. I don’t do this every night but it’s a nice way to close a busy day. And the relationship is pretty relaxed. They don’t mind too much whether I join them or not because they died several years ago.
What to do with the remains of the dear departed is a problem many of us will face in our lives. If you opt to have a loved one buried then that is a problem of another magnitude entirely, because not only is it very expensive for city-dwellers to secure a spot in a handy graveyard, but available land is in perilously short supply.
My solution was an easy one. Kind of. My dad died first and we had him cremated, as most Australians choose to do. His ashes stood on the bar in my mother’s home because she thought that was a good place but personally, I don’t think any place is a good place to stare at a gaudy urn symbolizing the tackiness of modern death. This extravagant vessel, lavishly gilded and festooned with a relief of bluebirds paused cryogenically mid-flight, was purchased by my mother from the crematorium the day I took her to pick up his ashes. We were in no mood on that sombre occasion to sign up for the next expensive step, a spot in their lawn or garden. So dad took his place on the bar, not far from the desk where he once ran quite a profitable little empire of companies, and assumed silent dominion over his familiar territory.
Ten years later, at the age of 95, my mother took leave of this world and sought a livelier realm than her dreary nursing home. Released at last, the girl who worked in a woollen mill during the war slid through a gap in the warp and weft of time back to 1943, I’m guessing, to kick up her heels again with handsome American servicemen at the Sydney Trocadero. I suspect she is still there in preference to eternity with my charming and generous but unfaithful father.
Another cremation ensues, another polystyrene box of ashes demands to be put somewhere but this time no one encourages me to buy an urn. The lady at the crematorium is lovely and we get down to business. I would like to see my parents ashes in a small personalized garden.
The options are rolled out and the costs.
Really? How much?? Wow, I had no idea…
Snappy moderation of the memorial wish list ensues. How much to have them share a little garden with other departed souls? Still that much eh? Five thousand for a couple of roses in a communal space? If that’s what it costs I guess I will have to cough up.
Of course I am aware that there are no-cost options. But I don’t fancy scattering their ashes and suffering a sinus-y reaction to my powdery parents though intellectually I see the sense in this humble solution. Yet it isn’t for me. I sign on the dotted line and leave my dad’s urn there on the desk too. It’s settled. They will be pushing up roses because daisies weren’t even offered.
There it might have ended but for the deep feeling of unease that accompanies my decision. On the way home I ring my sister who berates me, inflaming my simmering misgivings. Mum and Dad would hate that, she tells me. We’re never going to visit the crematorium. Five thousand?? Are you kidding? Is it too late to get out of it?
I call the nice lady as soon as I am home and apologetically explain that there has been a change of heart. Is it too late to retrieve my cheque and the ashes? She reacts sympathetically. A cooling off period applies – no pun intended - and I get the feeling that I am not the first to make such a call.
An hour later my parents are side by side on the back seat of the car heading to my home. I have a grassy back yard and a plan is forming. Within weeks a landscaper digs a moderately deep hole in part of my garden. When he has finished I take out the gilded urn and suddenly realize that my mother’s ashes, in their polystyrene packaging, should also be accorded the dignity of a container. But what? Then I remember the Bendigo pottery bread crock she once bought me which is unused. Mum fits perfectly into the earthen crock and without ceremony or tears I place my parents side by side in the hole with only one final admonishment. Don’t fight, you two. Then we gently shovel the dirt back into the hole.
Finally the landscaper builds a sandstone paved area big enough for a table and garden bench over the top of the hole. All around are the plants my parents loved, creating a convivial area that draws us outdoors, usually glass in hand. My astute dad would tell me it’s added some value to the property and it cost a lot less than the plot at the crematorium.
But, I hear you ask, what happens if and when you move on? And the answer is nothing. They stay. In the absence of a plaque no one need ever know the back story to our stylish bit of paving, and this sentimental communion with my parents does not have to last forever.
I foresee two possible scenarios, and both are fine. Developers may one day level their final resting place for medium density housing and for just an instant some bulldozer driver might ponder the strange fragments of pottery being unearthed. Or better still some archeologists in the far, far distant future will speculate whether one of these people was an aristocrat too important to be buried with the masses in a communal garden, as evidenced by the magnificence of the gilded urn with bluebirds. As for the remains placed in a common vessel for holding bread, they will assume that she was a domestic slave. And if the dead could speak she would agree.
Beautiful piece of writing and honestly the best option in the death catalogue. I personally want my ashes placed under a wood bench in Central Park with a amall plaque that reads “Here lies Lucie who enjoyed a good sit and hard wood”.