I did a strange thing last night. I poured the remains of my brother in law from a mason jar into a ziplock baggie.
Before my husband's brother died, he requested that some of his ashes be spread over the Pacific Ocean: the place he had learned to surf, a place of family vacations, a place he loved. We buried some of them in a memorial garden on a cold February day after his memorial service, as the wind blew snow in swirls around us. But the rest will finally be released into the waters of the Pacific this week.
This morning my husband took a plane to California, and I was charged with making sure that the ashes would pass through security. Hence the baggie. Double bagged, actually.
This afternoon the jar was still sitting on the kitchen counter. I decided it might make an interesting subject for today's project365 photograph.
021 : 365To dust we shall return
You can see that there is still a bit of dust in the bottom of jar.
cross posted from View from the Maypole
9 comments:
i remember taking my nana's ashes to lake tahoe in a baggie inside a tin. i'm sure he will be so pleased to know that he will be surfing the great pacific again.
Sounds like a perfect place to release him back to the earth.
I hope you make it through security easily. :)
I like that shot very much.
I also like the idea of scattering ashes. I dislike monuments and places that need to be tended after death.
I'd like to be cremated, too, so that pieces of me can be returned to places that are important to me. The thought of being buried kind of skeeves me out.
--I hope your husband feels a closeness with his brother as he releases his ashes. When my dad died (we buried him) but we drove up the canyon where he worked a large part of his life, made a campfire, read stories from his memoirs and then burned the pages. The next morning I gathered ashes from that campfire. They are in a mason jar in my bedroom.
Oh wow...that is quite a stunning photo...
My aunt died recently at 98, and her family took her ashes and those of her husband (who died maybe 15 years ago) and released them into the Pacific Ocean, which they had both loved.
Beautiful shot, and humbling too.
What an amazing shot. It almost gives me vertigo.
My aunt's ashes are in a grove in our sugar bush, where mine and Jim's, I hope, will one day join them. I got a small wooden box to scatter from and have kept it for future use.
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