Planning for Creative Sendoffs

Last week, I read about creative souls submitting plans to The Final Curtain for their own internment.   Most proposals were from artists, generally younger, with  adolescent ideas like Nick who wants ‘Nick is Dead’ in neon to mark his grave. The others dealt with ashes. Tom wants his ashes in his life box of objects, and Mary wants her ashes in an ant farm while Alex wants his in a giant etch-a-sketch.

Well, why not enjoy your creativity in planning your own send-off? I took myself to my  archives to find wonderful examples of inspired and creative planning.

If you care about design why not a international-design-winning hand-crafted Cocoon, instead of a casket.

 You might show your environmental consciousness with a wicker coffin, choose to be buried standing up so you take up less room or have your body frozen brittle to be ground into mulch for roses.

Harrod's boss, Mohammed al-Fayed wants to become a clock-mummy atop his Knightsbridge store.

I like the idea of a mahoghany hourglass so you can keep time forever.   In the Final Curtain's gallery of proposals, artist Michelle Le Brun wants to combine her ashes with those of her husband in an hourglass, with one teaspoon to be taken out each year to plant a fruit tree.  When the hourglass is empty,  she wants the glass broken and the shards thrown into the ocean to be turned by time and waves into sea glass gems.

Blue Light Coffins are handcrafted bookscases or tables you can use as beautiful furniture that converts when the time is right.

I think sexy coffins miss the point but I like designer coffins.    Generally, I prefer the traditional such as the classic wooden caskets from a Trappist monastery though these translucent tombstones are beautiful and long-lasting.

Have you ever seen anything more tender and beautiful than this Arundel tomb?

Hunters might prefer their caskets in camouflage while bikers go for Harleycaskets.

Status seekers will go for McMansion Mausoleums  while New England Brahmins prefer a tonier location and real estate to die for.  

Maybe you can be creative with what you want buried with you.  More and more are being buried with modern day totems – cells phones, Blackberries and laptops. Some will even want to be buried with their porn.

If you choose cremation, new opportunities arise.

Your ashes can become a diamond forever  or encased in a hand-crafted urn, commissioned from an artist with Creative Cremains.

You can have your cremated remains scattered from a giant balloon, go out in a bang with a fireworks display,  blasted from a cannon like Hunter Thompson or launched in space like Gene Roddenberry and Timothy Leary.  If you want your ashes scattered on a football field,  for heaven's sake, tell your executor, not at half-time in a stadium full of fans before a national audience.

You don’t have to practice throwing yourself a funeral every year like Turk to be creative in the small details.  In lieu of flowers, request that people buy coffee for the person behind them in line at the coffee shop and say it’s from Stan.
 
At minimum, you can choose your favorite music, but I draw the line at Viva Las Vegas.  That's not creative, that's insulting.