Brennig Jones (and friends)

I know I’ve been quiet lately, and here’s the reason…

I’ve spent the last few days mulling a very difficult issue, spent so much time thinking about it that at times my brain felt as if it had a reduced operating capability, while a portion of my mental RAM was allocated to this other task.

Burial or cremation?

Having to decide which – and having to decide which of these for someone else – is more difficult than I had thought.

They’re both so… final, which, given the circumstances, is good, but there’s the almost aesthetic principles to weigh up.

The decision has to fit the person, if you know what I mean?

And that’s so… hard to reconcile.

Because we never really know – not 100% really and truly – another person, do we?

We all have the capacity to surprise – and be surprised by – someone else.

Even if that someone else was your own mother.

You can’t tell me that you *really* know someone, to the point of knowing what he or she wants all the time, no matter how long you’ve known them; I’m not sure I would believe it, not believe it would be so *all* of the time.

So, burial or cremation?

It hasn’t been easy, but yesterday afternoon I decided that cremation would be more appropriate.

However, imagine how I felt when I rang the undertaker to tell them my decision, only to be told that she actually had to be dead first?

I am completely gobsmacked.

[p.s. I'm sorry if this offended you. It did shock Sophie, but I tried to explain that it was just my sense of humour being let out for a ramble. There's no real malice here, it's just a piece for inclusion in my short story anthology]