All about the unavoidable
Americans who visit cemeteries because they find them beautiful and interesting are often maligned, but they aren't really a problem. It's the thrill-seekers, ghost-hunters and Halloween tourists you have to worry about. One such example is what has happened in an old cemetery outside Austin, Texas.
Read MoreHeadstones are really just individual monuments. A stone to represent a life and to bring back into existence some part of that individual; a stone to occupy the physical place where that person no longer stands. It provides a means of proving that they were real, a rock to touch because their arm is gone.
Read MoreNow, four years later, the topic I picked for amusement has actually become my passion, and writing that essay is, arguably, the foundational event for the creation of Alternative Undertakings. In honor of that history, the next few weeks will be that essay: slightly re-edited and serialized.
Read MoreA wake or shemira. An abhisegam. A coin placed on the eyes or in the mouth. It’s pretty much impossible to not have some form of pre-funeral ritual. What led to the "traditional" American pre-funeral ritual of embalming?
Read MoreI myself have had a skeleton on my mind for several months, though this one is not generic remains of a dead human. The Bony Lady, Skinny Lady, clad in a shroud-robe and carrying a scythe, I have been thinking about Holy Death: Santa Muerta.
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