No hiding place
It's a ticklish business, if you've never done it before, launching a website.
Launch? That's a big verb. It's not what it felt like: no tarantara, no wild whooping, no champagne-dripping prow.
Nothing like that at all. Simply, Harry, my webmeister, emailed late one uneventful evening. "You're live," he said. I inhaled a deep breath of expectation and held it (as you do).
Nothing happened.
That suited me very well because I was then struck down by the sort of virus that has all the malignant force of an inept practical joke. It makes the world whirl nauseously, then moderates and settles down to conducting a guerrilla campaign against your sense of balance. You feel drunk all the time, but shabbily so. It's called labyrinthitis. I hope you never get it.
While my world spun and I lurched, the bathos continued. I had supposed that people would eventually spot me, stroll up and have a chat. I felt vulnerable, of course, though this is the point of the exercise: to encourage collaboration. But I know (you too) that there are jealous, angry egos in the world of death and funerals; and we know, too, that there are also bedlamites in cyberspace ready to squeak and gibber at us in foam-flecked lower case in which even the plurals are unapostrophised. In these last days of passing unnoticed among strangers I have relished my anonymity, my peace and the decorum of my inbox.
I have broken cover. I have been talking to the well-connected blogger Zinnia Cyclamen, whose prose has that limpid quality which is the product of intellect, fastidiousness and rigour, and in whose presence one's own punctuation and grammar reflexively adopt their best behaviour. Zinnia is a writer and a humanist funeral celebrant whose adventures are a must-read.
Zinnia has read a tranche of my text and critiqued it with an acuteness which has both enriched my thinking and exposed my prejuduces. Dammit, I'd meant to keep them tethered; I don't want the Good Funeral Guide to be a manifesto. I must go straight to work and dig the me-ness out of it, especially in the section Creating the Ceremony. The process of evolution has begun.
Zinnia has also written about me on her blog and invited her e-chums to have a gander. You are very welcome.
I hope that, together, we can make something we are all proud of.
Oh heck, I've just checked my inbox. While I've been writing this, the first-ever comment has come in.
It's nice. Thank you, Jan!
Launch? That's a big verb. It's not what it felt like: no tarantara, no wild whooping, no champagne-dripping prow.
Nothing like that at all. Simply, Harry, my webmeister, emailed late one uneventful evening. "You're live," he said. I inhaled a deep breath of expectation and held it (as you do).
Nothing happened.
That suited me very well because I was then struck down by the sort of virus that has all the malignant force of an inept practical joke. It makes the world whirl nauseously, then moderates and settles down to conducting a guerrilla campaign against your sense of balance. You feel drunk all the time, but shabbily so. It's called labyrinthitis. I hope you never get it.
While my world spun and I lurched, the bathos continued. I had supposed that people would eventually spot me, stroll up and have a chat. I felt vulnerable, of course, though this is the point of the exercise: to encourage collaboration. But I know (you too) that there are jealous, angry egos in the world of death and funerals; and we know, too, that there are also bedlamites in cyberspace ready to squeak and gibber at us in foam-flecked lower case in which even the plurals are unapostrophised. In these last days of passing unnoticed among strangers I have relished my anonymity, my peace and the decorum of my inbox.
I have broken cover. I have been talking to the well-connected blogger Zinnia Cyclamen, whose prose has that limpid quality which is the product of intellect, fastidiousness and rigour, and in whose presence one's own punctuation and grammar reflexively adopt their best behaviour. Zinnia is a writer and a humanist funeral celebrant whose adventures are a must-read.
Zinnia has read a tranche of my text and critiqued it with an acuteness which has both enriched my thinking and exposed my prejuduces. Dammit, I'd meant to keep them tethered; I don't want the Good Funeral Guide to be a manifesto. I must go straight to work and dig the me-ness out of it, especially in the section Creating the Ceremony. The process of evolution has begun.
Zinnia has also written about me on her blog and invited her e-chums to have a gander. You are very welcome.
I hope that, together, we can make something we are all proud of.
Oh heck, I've just checked my inbox. While I've been writing this, the first-ever comment has come in.
It's nice. Thank you, Jan!
posted by Charles Cowling at
10:17
2 Comments:
Dear Charles,
Welcome to the online world!
I look forward to reading your thoughts and will work hard to come by for a visit now and then.
Thanks for doing your part to get the word about choices and options out. As Kevin Kelly says, "feed the web." Choice is a very, very, very good thing, and informed choice makes it all so much nicer, don't you think?
One thought for you -- please don't try and sanitize it all of yourself too much. That's impossible, and will only confuse the lot of us. I'm sure that at least some people will value your educated opinion more than they will value the fact that you think you've kept your opinion out of things (I suppose that's an opinion, too).
Of course, watching us all struggle with trying to keep our opinions and biases out of things, and exposing us when we fail, may be half the fun for everyone else, so what do I know?
I'm just pleased you've taken on the task of illuminating another corner of this end-of-life thing we all seem to have grabbed a piece of. It will be interesting to see what happens over the next 5 years as we all come to see each other and share what we know.
in trees,
Cynthia
Cynthia Beal
Founder, Natural Burial Company, USA -
serving a more natural end...
My sites:
http://www.naturalburialcompany.com
http://www.beatree.com
http://www.alternativefuneralmonitor.com
We, BTW, promote alternative funeral options with a natural focus in the US and I have learned a lot from my peers and colleagues in the UK. We represent Somerset Willow, the ARKA Ecopod, Natural Woven Products, Fine Timber Products, and several other lines into the US and Canada, with an eye to creating a similar natural-burial option over here. We work closely with funeral directors and home-funeral guides (I'm just completing my own certification) and we honor the useful work of everyone.
I hope to make more UK connections with like-minded folks in the coming years, and perhaps your site will be one good place to do so.
Cynthia, how kind of you to write.
I've been looking at your sites, and I take back anything I might ever have said about lack of recognition, in the burgeoning US market for green and home funerals, of the pioneering work of the UK's Natural Death Centre. You pay ample tribute, and your support for UK coffin makers is a fine tribute to some superb products and to some outstanding funeral practitioners (though I wonder whether, if you are to be true to your green principles, you should not be sourcing your coffins locally).
What is really striking is the energy that courses through your websites, and through those of your fellow campaigners. In the UK, green and alternative funerals have not taken off in a way which makes the business lives of practitioners easy. Early momentum seems to have sagged somewhat. There hasn't, in the upshot, been much uptake. Green funerals in the UK have not been thought through fully, in my opinion; they have become more an aesthetic than an ethical choice. Woodland burial grounds and willow coffins are popular; home funerals are rare.
Home funerals, or DIY funerals as they are often called here, have been much talked about but have not taken off enough to generate even one detailed practical printed guide to looking after the body of a dead person at home. This is a potentially perilous and terrifying undertaking if the body begins to decompose fast, as can happen to, say, the bodies of people who die of cancer. In this respect, I note that Jerrigrace Lyons of Final Passages -- www.finalpassages.org -- has published one, and I have ordered a copy. I have also ordered Lisa Carlson's 'Caring For The Dead' from Amazon. And I note the work of Tammy Beilstein of embracinghomefunerals.com, who works with families to guide them through the process. Hers is, arguably, an indispensable role.
Cynthia, if there's anything in symbiosis, you and your fellow campaigners are going to reinvigorate UK green and home funerals.
Then it will be our turn to pay tribute to you!
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