On Tue, 9 Jul 2013 wrote:

In article ,
Janet wrote:

I've had this great commercial idea for sustainable eco-funerals. It's
the Decomposerheap. Large gardens could install their own. There will be
Decomposerheaps in local parks and beauty spots for those with no
gardens, or lots more money.

My wife and daughters have refused point-blank to put my dead body
on the compost heap - despite my pointing out that I shall have
lost all interest in it by then :-)

Is that out of respect for you or the compost heap?

As I may have mentioned here before I am an organist several days a week
at the local crematorium. In that way I am fairly familiar with the
processes involved. When bodies are cremated, just about all of the
remains are burned away leaving little residue apart from the bones
which are then put in a grinder. When a family asks for the ashes of
their relative, what is actually in the urn is 99% powdered bone plus
some wood ash from the coffin which, I would imagine, is excellent stuff
for putting on a compost heap - or even directly around one's roses!

I am the only one in our family who has opted for burial rather than
cremation and we have bought a plot in the cemetery just across the road
from our house in Normandy. So, in the fullness of time, it will contain
my coffin along with urns of ashes of the rest of the family!

David

--
David Rance writing from Caversham, Reading, UK