I've been me
aning to write about ash distribution for some time. You may think me morbid, with my seeming obsession with scattering my parents' ashes all over the world. But what can I say? It feels right. And for whatever reason, I feel compelled to document their dispersal in this blog. (See earlier posts about Dad on the beach, at Grandma's grave, and around San Francisco.) Why do I even bother? Do I really believe that some part of their soul or essence will remain in these locations; locations that mean something to me, or meant something to them? Perhaps. Or maybe I just don't want to be burdened with a box full of human remains, and so I'd rather distribute them in a tasteful and loving way. Or all of the above.
This spring I scattered some of Mom's ashes around La Jolla shores: up on the cliffs where we had her memorial gathering, overlooking the Pacific Ocean; and under the Pier that juts out into the ocean from her former office at Scripps Institute of Oceanography. Now Mom and Dad are both scattered on the shores of La Jolla, but I took care to place them at opposite ends! Not that it matters, since their ashes were almost immediately washed out to sea where everything co-mingles anyway -- just like our souls or energy (or whatever it is) rejoins the greater energy force (or whatever you want to call it) when we leave this earthly sphere. But they both needed to be scattered in La Jolla because that's where I was conceived.
aning to write about ash distribution for some time. You may think me morbid, with my seeming obsession with scattering my parents' ashes all over the world. But what can I say? It feels right. And for whatever reason, I feel compelled to document their dispersal in this blog. (See earlier posts about Dad on the beach, at Grandma's grave, and around San Francisco.) Why do I even bother? Do I really believe that some part of their soul or essence will remain in these locations; locations that mean something to me, or meant something to them? Perhaps. Or maybe I just don't want to be burdened with a box full of human remains, and so I'd rather distribute them in a tasteful and loving way. Or all of the above.
This spring I scattered some of Mom's ashes around La Jolla shores: up on the cliffs where we had her memorial gathering, overlooking the Pacific Ocean; and under the Pier that juts out into the ocean from her former office at Scripps Institute of Oceanography. Now Mom and Dad are both scattered on the shores of La Jolla, but I took care to place them at opposite ends! Not that it matters, since their ashes were almost immediately washed out to sea where everything co-mingles anyway -- just like our souls or energy (or whatever it is) rejoins the greater energy force (or whatever you want to call it) when we leave this earthly sphere. But they both needed to be scattered in La Jolla because that's where I was conceived.
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