How ashes turned into a conversation about butts

When I cremated Pete, I didn’t ever expect discussion with the children to turn to whether they were smelling their father’s butt or not.

But it has (pun intended).

Pete didn’t want to be buried anywhere.

He didn’t know that any one place where he would want to be forever. So he wanted to be cremated.

It was about the only thing we had discussed in our marriage when it came to what would happen if one of us died. On discussing it a few years ago, he resolved the following:

The Victorian Western District – our current location – too wet. Also, he may have made disparaging remarks about its climate over the time … definitely too cold and wet.

Conargo – no cemetery

Deniliquin – he never really lived there, despite it being where he spent a lot of his time running amok.

Hay – where he lived the longest and during his formative childhood teen years – he hadn’t been there for years and he had no family there.

Wagga – where his parents live – he hadn’t lived there for any length of time to feel he had a strong enough association with the place.

He had been born in Moree and spent time in Taree and Sydney during his childhood, and we as a couple and family had moved around between Albury, Swan Hill, Goolgowi, Coleambally, Deniliquin and Hamilton.

So, he decided, being buried wasn’t for him because he was never really good at staying in the one spot.

Cremating Pete also brought about a whole other set of ‘advantages’ … as far as advantages about your dead husband go.

He’s very portable and can be split up into many things.

For the children, that means trinkets on necklaces and wristbands so their father can be with them all of the time.

I’m pretty sure I’ve stuffed up a bit of this parenting post-death thing, but buying necklaces with their father’s ashes in them for the children is, hands down, the best decision I have made.

He is then with them, always.

They hold the pendants with the ashes in them and say goodnight to him each evening, they talk to him in bed after good and bad days, they wake up and say good morning to him.

It also means that with the advent of technology, Pete can be turned into a diamond by sending off some of his ashes to companies that then extract the carbon under pressure to create a flawless jewel … I may get my eternity ring after all … he hadn't bought me one, so he can become one.

The girls have also asked if they could have a diamond made of Pete later in their lives so they can have him always.

But when the kids received their ashes-filled trinkets from the funeral director the conversation went like this:

Child 4: sniff sniff “Mum, why does this smell like burning?”

Me: “What?”

Child 4: still sniffing pendant “This, why does this smell like burning?”

Me: “Don’t put it up your nose, its not ok to put it up your nose!”

Other children begin sniffing their pendants

Other children: “Mine doesn’t smell. What is it meant to smell like?”

Me: “Stop smelling them!”

Child 3: “Oh, imagine if you got Dad’s butt! He always said it smelled like roses, and it NEVER smelled like roses!”

Other children: “Yeah, it never smelled like roses. It smelled disgusting!”

And so the conversation ensued about which body parts they might have represented in their pendants, which hold approximately ½ a teaspoon of ashes.

They went through wanting his eyes and his smile or his arms so it would be like him cuddling them.

But nobody wanted his butt … I might turn that into a diamond.