Trash Metal & English Oaks | 4M #133

Welcome to the hundred-and-thirty-third edition of Morticians’ Monday Morning Mashup, 4M #133, where we’ll serve up bite-sized, easily-digestible nuggets of the deathcare news you need to crush conversations in the week ahead. Bon appetit!

Today’s 4M is sponsored by Return Home, an incredibly cool and kind company committed to sharing all things Terramation with Connecting Directors readers. 

Do you know NOR?

Natural organic reduction.

Human composting.

Whatever you call it in your neck of the woods, it’s the next wave in disposition … and you need to have your surfboard ready to go.

Micah Truman and the Return Home team are on a mission to educate the world on all things Terramation (a beautiful term they coined for the process) one video at a time. Seven states have legalized Terramation, and more than a dozen others are working on legislation. Even if your state isn’t on that list, the families you serve will be asking questions. Micah and the Return Homies are here to help you answer them.

Let’s start with a quick tour of the Return Home facility, with the one-and-only Micah as your tour guide. 

So … How old do you think Tully is? Email info@returnhome.com with your best guess! Micah promised a prize to the winner — let’s hold him to it!

What was your favorite part of the video?

• Micah sniffing burlap bags of soil
• Jake not working
• Learning where the bathrooms were located

Stay tuned for more from Micah and the team, and send any and all questions you’d like for us to cover in future videos to info@returnhome.com!

Interested in Partnering With Return Home? Schedule a Call With Our Team Below!

$300k trash

A former cemetery employee has pleaded guilty to theft after netting more than $300,000 from selling cremation metals to recyclers over five years. Apparently, the 67-year-old Minnesota man regarded the “scorched metals” as “trash” and therefore fair game for his own profit-making enterprise. The cemetery, however, thought differently, labeling the metal as stolen property; the man was found guilty of “theft by swindle” and will be on probation for five years.

Demolition scheduled

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has set a date to demolish the Return to Nature facility in Penrose, Colorado, where nearly 200 bodies were found in varying stages of decomposition in October. The demo, which is now scheduled for April 16, has been delayed due to weather and “logistical issues,” including finding a landfill that would accept the debris. Two sites in Fremont County, Colorado, where the facility is located, refused, but the EPA reached an agreement with a landfill in a nearby county.

Forever love

A new policy pertaining to the disposition of fetuses in Hong Kong has created a precious opportunity for grieving parents. Prior to 2018, fetal remains under 24 weeks were classified as medical waste and disposed of accordingly. Thanks in great part to the lobbying efforts of a group of moms, the law was changed to provide free cremation services to fetal remains under 24 weeks — even those that go unclaimed. In 2022, the Home of Forever Love became the first and only crematory in Hong Kong to handle those cremations. The city also provides several locations, including one called the Garden of Forever Love, for permanent placement and memorialization of these babies’ cremains.

No satisfaction from that

For years, seemingly-immortal Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards has alternately confirmed then denied a strange rumor that he snorted the ashes of his deceased father. In 2007, one publication quoted Richards as saying he mixed his father Bert’s cremains with “a little bit of blow.” Later, he denied the whole thing, claiming the publication had “taken liberties” with his statement. However, in his 2010 memoir, Richards explained that he had planned to scatter his father’s cremains among the roots of a newly-planted English Oak tree. When he opened the container, the wind caught a bit of the ashes. “I couldn’t brush him off, so I wiped my finger over it and snorted the residue,” Richards explained in the book. “Ashes to ashes, father to son. He is now growing oak trees and would love me for it.”

Too controversial

We all know that getting any type of legislation passed is never a walk in the park; so many factors can impact the path and potential success of any bill. For example, Illinois legislators are currently faced with 35 bills — too many to consider at one time, especially in an election year. So, to determine which issues get attention, legislators are prioritizing allocation bills (those that are requesting a chunk of the state’s budget) and postponing others that are more “controversial.” Unfortunately, the state’s human composting bill falls under the latter category. “We’ve taken a look at the end-of-life bill and a few others, but I think those controversial bills will be sidelined because of the election year,” one senator told a local outlet.

Bringing barrows back, yeah

A UK undertaker has received approval to bring back a “very unique and timeless” disposition method: burial mounds … but with a twist. The tradition of placing bodies in stone or wooden vaults and burying those in large mounds of soil was last practiced in the Stone and Bronze Ages. A.W. Lymn Funeral Home says they will recreate the “barrow” structure of the mounds like the one above, but instead of bodies in vaults, they will place cremains inside.

We love a good listicle

Mental Floss recently published a video in its “Misconceptions” series entitled “Misconceptions About Funerals,” in which host Justin Dodd shares seven common “laugh-a-minute myths” about deathcare, including:

• Bodies are not always transported in hearses;
• You need to buy a casket from the funeral home;
• You can’t have a funeral for someone who is already cremated; 
• Funeral expenses are covered in wills or insurance; and
• Funeral processions have to end at a cemetery (they could end in your backyard instead).