In Repose Blog

The Not-Quite-Ordinary Life

For a long while I have asserted that any ideas concerning death, are really at their core, ideas about life itself.  So discussing all of what life contains, its richness, its riddles, its purpose...all of those things seem fair subjects for me to explore here at In Repose.

For whatever reason I have lived at times, a not quite ordinary life. I have had many odd, scary, and just downright plain strange experiences over the years and for the most part, I have kept them to myself. In doing so, I have for a long time, felt different than most people.

At first, in my childhood, and then into my twenties, i kept most of my odd experiences from my parents and own husband. I really thought, my very logical, sensible, grounded man would either try to have me committed or divorce me if I shared all the wild things that have happened to me. Well, I shouldn't have worried, as I was quite wrong about that. For whatever reason, or perhaps for many reasons, he has only been supportive and I think, believes most if not all of the crazy things I share with him.

But the time seems right to record those things for family, posterity and myself, and so I have started talking to others about these things and even, have begun to share them here on In Repose. Stay tuned for some interesting posts to come.

Next Up, my friend Jamie Sue Austin, and her reaction to my "revelations" of living the "not-quite-ordinary" life.

In Repose Photo

As a visual artist, my brain naturally operates primarily in a visual mode. The photos I add to my posts here on In Repose are always carefully chosen, if not taken or actually created by yours truly.

I have found that because I think in this way, I really like to know what people look like when I have only known their written or spoken word. Radio personalities and magazine and blog writers require a face for my brain, especially if I am a regular reader. If a likeness is not provided my imagination provides one for me. I really get bummed when my made-up visual is a complete disconnect with the actual face.

With that in mind, and after a similar request for a photo of me for a magazine article coming up,  I present to you here a favorite photograph as it occurs to me many of my regular readers might want to have a face with MY name and writings. Its not a close up, but it describes me perfectly.

It was taken in the Spring of 2005, so its not terribly recent, but I hope I have not changed or aged too much in the couple of years since then. I like it because it really is ME in the best sense and in my best description of myself as a horse woman and rancher. Other than time with my family, I am most happy while riding, and I think the photographer, Shawn Hamilton of clixphoto.com , really captured that feeling in this image of me riding my beautiful blue eyed gelding paint horse Rio.

 

Blogging on Death, (I'm not the only one)

People often ask me how I can run this business. How can I focus on death all day long? I guess that question could be asked of others; morticians, embalmers, medical examiners, doctors, just to name a few.

I know other people who blog on the subject and probably get asked similar questions. I have made some pretty cool friends with some of them. I just this moment opened this alert from Google:

Google Blogs Alert for: cremation

Creating a "Must-Have" Funeral Experience
 By finalembrace
Each discussion I have with funeral directors seems to entail higher and higher-pitched moaning about the speed at which babyboomers are rushing toward direct cremation and alternative funeral services. Folks, the world moves forward. ...
- http://finalembrace.wordpress.com

Win a FREE Prepaid Cremation!
 By Candace
That Neptune lists its "cremation container" at $298 is further evidence of milking the situation for its own benefit--to the detriment of consumers. No state will tell a company how much it may or may not charge for various items of ...
In Repose Blog - http://inrepose.typepad.com/in_repose_blog/

I thought that was pretty cool. Timothy Totten of Final Embrace is one of my new blogging buddies and a prominent voice in the funeral industry. I am learning quite a bit from him. Tim also writes a column just for In Repose called "Ask Our Funeral Professional" You might have seen it here on our blog. If not, I am archiving these columns on the Resource Forum and you can read them there.

Tim is quite a fellow, full of life. His blog is highly entertaining and is not as morbid as you might imagine.

Anyone who has been a regular reader of this blog knows that the subjects I cover are actually quite varied and are not always directly about death. Current  events, historical accounts, personal stories, helpful advice, financial information, art, cultural topics and sometimes, a little bit of humor are just a few of the things I have been writing about. I don't see my writing, really, as focusing on death all the time at all. I am not sure I could continue doing this if it did.

And, when that question is posed to me I try to answer it this way: If you think about it for a moment, every single thing I write about affects the living.

The dead have already moved on.