Ash scattering
My Gran (as mentioned in my previous post) regularly asked, begged and pleaded to go home in her last year or two (mostly spent between hospitals and the nursing home). Of course it was impossible to do as she wished because of the care she required, added to this she often thought that wherever she was, was actually a new extension my uncle had built on her house?! i remember one deluded story about her and a friend from the nursing home having been to Australia. That very morning. or the princely fare of £2!.

I digress. Because she'd always asked to go home we decided that after she'd been cremated we would 'bury' her ashes under a new rose bush that we would plant in the little garden she'd enjoyed so much at home (a long 'raised bed' that my brickie uncle had built to waist height for her so she could garden without having to kneel). It felt a bit cheesy to be honest, like the aim of a little ceremony hadn't quite been met and seemed to evolve into a chore.

Similar to the post below, my uncle didn't think about the effect of dumping a large tub of fine powder into a small hole, and duly got a liberal dusting of 'Gran' over his upper body & head. My brother and I looked at one another and I actually made my mouth bleed by biting my cheek to suppress the giggles.


On the subject of ashes, I think my mother still has my stepdad in her house somewhere. She'd planned to scatter them in Spain, but hasn't been back yet. The odd thing was that over the course of her moving house (about a year after he died) I accumulated a few items in the boot of my car, as I always tend to do.

A week or two after the move, I was cleaning the car & emptied the boot of these miscellaneous items;
My stepdads ashes,
A garden spade,
A book on pathology,
Some sensetive papers including my stepbrothers suicide note, numerous death certificates / coroners reports and a stack of debt-letters.

Thank fuck I wasn't pulled over & had the car searched that week!
(Greencloud Wanted to go fishing on, Fri 29 Feb 2008, 15:01, Reply)