Forest of Memories

Reviewed By: David Finkle

The problem that the English are traditionally fabled to have with expressing their feelings gets a vigorous workout in Laura Wade’s Colder Than Here. The reason for this old topic being given the once-, twice- and thrice-over here is Myra, whose bone cancer is rapidly spreading throughout her thin frame. In the throes of the onslaught, she has abruptly realized that she must prepare her husband and two daughters for her inevitable demise in the six months or so she’s been told are left her.

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Their father’s funeral isn’t necessarily what baby boomers want for themselves. Even in death, they prefer to personalize everything and make a statement.

By SHARON GINN, St. Petersburg Times.

Since the first baby boomers were born nearly 60 years ago, they’ve found a way to shake up nearly every industry they have come in contact with. In death it will be no different.

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The latest trend in undertaking gives new meaning to the term ‘dust to dust’

By Patricia Leigh Brown, The Sydney Morning Herald

TOMMY Odom’s remains lie on a steep, windswept hill at Fernwood Cemetery, New Jersey, beneath an oak sapling, a piece of petrified wood and a bundle of dried sage tied with a lavender ribbon. When he died in a traffic accident last year, Odom, 41, became the first of 40 people at Fernwood to move on to greener pastures - literally.

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Fernwood Cemetery in Marin County now offers green burials.

By - 30 Minutes Bay Area, CBS-5 (San Francisco)

The green burial movement started in the United Kingdom where there are now about 150 sites. Dr. Billy Campbell founded the US’s first green burial cemetery in Westminster, SC. Opened in 1998, the Ramsey Creek Preserve now has had about 100 burials and sold an additional 50-100 plots. Campbell says that there are about 20 green burial cemeteries in development across the country but only four open for business including his and Fernwood in Marin.

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Lori Valigra, National Geographic News

A burial in outer space seems a fitting farewell for James Doohan, the actor who played the beloved engineer “Scotty” on Star Trek. To honor his final wishes, some of Doohan’s ashes will be shot into space this fall, along with a CD of tributes from fans and loved ones.

Celebrities aren’t the only ones considering alternatives to a conventional funeral. More people in the U.S. are rejecting traditional burials as too costly and ecologically unsound. Instead they are chosing environmentally friendly, and often highly personalized, goodbyes.

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