Mortality

After the Nicole's grandfathers' burial it got me thinking about death and what we do with our deceased. First off I never really understood why we as a people bury our loved ones in the ground in a giant wooden box that’s lined with pillows inside. I’m not sure if coffins are still made out of wood nowadays but it seems like a waste of a good tree. Especially nowadays with our recycling and saving the rain forest and what not. It’s not like we can recycle caskets, that would be a little disturbing. Next, why is the casket lined with pillows and soft material inside? It seems very trivial to me, I don’t care if my body is comfortable when I’m dead.

We need to stop burying people, cemetaries are getting crowded and it is taking up a lot of space and land. I understand that it’s tradition in people’s families to have a plot and be buried but soon there will be nowhere to put our deceased. I, for one want to be cremated like my father was. For one, it’s less of a burden on my family to waste all that money on a casket and funeral. Secondly I don’t want to take up space in the ground, I’d rather my ashes be scattered somewhere special. I know a lot of people would disagree with what I’m saying because of religious beliefs and all but this is how I feel. The one thing I do like about a cemetary is that you can go visit your loved ones and pay your respects when you need to.

I probably mostly feel this way because I don’t believe in God nor in Heaven or Hell. If Heaven is such a great place then what are we doing on this Planet? When people die I think we just end up as part of the Earth, our remains turn get reincarnated into a tree or a plant.
Death does scare me, I think about it every once in while. Such as when I die the world will go on forever without me, 1000 years down the line what will I become? I can’t fathom not being able to just think, what is it like to be dead?