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Elizabeth Fournier: A Celebration of Life, the Green Way
25 Plays3 years ago
Notice how many people are into renewable energy, protecting the environment, eco-friendly options, and so on? It is therefore not surprising that people can also embrace the green lifestyle even when handling the end-of-life phase through the so-called ‘green burial’ options.
This is the episode where the Glam Reaper, Jennifer, meets the Green Reaper, Elizabeth Fournier. Elizabeth is the author of “The Green Burial Guidebook: Everything You Need to Plan an Affordable, Environmentally Friendly Burial” and she helps families with how they want to celebrate the lives of their dearly departed. There are many options, of course, but being a member of the Advisory Board for the Green Burial Council, she is certainly an authority on the subject and why she is known as the “Green Reaper”. Enjoy listening!
LITTLE NUGGETS OF GOLD:
- About Elizabeth Fournier's journey in the funeral industry and her green burial initiative.
- What is the story of Elizabeth's first natural burial experience?
- How many states allow natural burial and what sorts of legal restrictions are there in every state?
- What are some problems that we can anticipate with natural burial and what precautions should be taken beforehand?
- How did that first natural burial go and how did Elizabeth's green journey progress from that?
- Does Elizabeth's funeral home only do green burials?
Resources:
Green Burial Council - https://www.greenburialcouncil.org/
National Home Funeral Alliance - https://www.homefuneralalliance.org/
Connect with Elizabeth Fournier:
Website - https://www.thegreenreaper.org/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/greenburial/
Twitter - http://www.twitter.com/elizfournier
Instagram - http://www.instagram.com/elizabethgreenreaper
Email - elizabeth@elizabethfournier.com
Connect with Jennifer/The Glam Reaper:
Facebook Page - Muldowney Memorials: https://www.facebook.com/MuldowneyMemorials/
Facebook Page - Rainbow Bridge Memorials: https://www.facebook.com/rainbowbridgememorialsdotcom
Instagram - @muldowneymemorials & @jennifermuldowney
Twitter - @TheGlamReaper
Email us here: glamreaperpodcast@gmail.com
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Transcript
Introduction to the Glam Reaper Podcast
00:00:00
Speaker
Hi and welcome to the Glam Reaper podcast.
00:00:02
Speaker
I'm your host Jennifer Muldaney aka the Glam Reaper herself.
00:00:06
Speaker
On today's episode we are talking to a fellow reaper but we are this time focusing on all things green.
00:00:14
Speaker
So let's take it away.
Meet Elizabeth, the Green Reaper
00:00:25
Speaker
Hello everybody and welcome to the Glam Reaper podcast.
00:00:30
Speaker
I have another Reaper on the show today which I'm quite excited about.
00:00:35
Speaker
So we are going to hear from Elizabeth who I guess well where I'm the glam she's the green.
00:00:43
Speaker
Even though I don't think I'm glam I just mine was just given to me by the media.
00:00:47
Speaker
But anyway here we go without further ado
00:00:49
Speaker
we have Elizabeth.
00:00:50
Speaker
Elizabeth, welcome to the Glam Reaper podcast.
00:00:52
Speaker
I love the names.
00:00:53
Speaker
They're fun.
00:00:54
Speaker
There's also a goal reaper in Portland, which is great.
00:00:57
Speaker
And I'm apparently not green, but given to me again by families because I'm a green burial person.
00:01:03
Speaker
I'd show up in the yard and they'd say, the green reaper is here.
00:01:07
Speaker
So I thought, well, that's kind of cute.
00:01:09
Speaker
I'll keep it, I guess.
00:01:10
Speaker
I don't have a cape that matches it.
00:01:12
Speaker
And I hope no one ever thinks it's
00:01:13
Speaker
sarcastic or I'm just trying to be sort of trite.
00:01:17
Speaker
It's just it was given to me and I think it's really endearing.
00:01:19
Speaker
It is kind of a spin off from the Grim Reaper, but I'm more of an effervescent, happy, green, organic one.
00:01:26
Speaker
There you go.
00:01:27
Speaker
Well, that's it.
00:01:28
Speaker
And I love that explanation because that's exactly how I feel.
00:01:31
Speaker
It was given to me and, you know, I just had to embrace it.
00:01:34
Speaker
I mean, I used to get called all things back in Ireland.
00:01:37
Speaker
And one I remember was dead girl.
00:01:39
Speaker
I'm like, what?
00:01:41
Speaker
I'm not dead.
00:01:43
Speaker
Anyway, there's always some fun.
00:01:46
Speaker
I guess it's probably because of the industry we all work in that everybody latches on to some bit of fun that we can to lighten everything and lighten the jobs that we do.
Transition to Green Burials
00:01:58
Speaker
So tell us, Elizabeth, A, where you're from, because I know it's not New York, it's definitely not Little Ireland, and B, yeah, how did the green, so you've already touched on the fact that you're green, which we are obsessed with here at the Glamour River Podcast, all things environmental.
00:02:12
Speaker
So yeah, give us a bit of a bio, what's going on?
00:02:15
Speaker
Sure.
00:02:16
Speaker
So I am a city person by naturalness, I suppose.
00:02:20
Speaker
I've lived in
00:02:22
Speaker
the San Francisco area and the Portland, Oregon area and the Seattle area.
00:02:26
Speaker
And I always thought of myself as a city person.
00:02:28
Speaker
And about 20 years ago, this tiny little funeral home in boring Oregon was looking for an undertaker.
00:02:35
Speaker
And I thought, oh, that's great.
00:02:36
Speaker
I'd already put in a decade or so putting my dues in.
00:02:41
Speaker
at corporations and different places.
00:02:44
Speaker
And I really, really, really wanted to do it my own way.
00:02:47
Speaker
And I really wanted to be able to help families how I felt that families should be helped.
00:02:53
Speaker
And fortunately, this little repurposed goat barn in Boring, Oregon, falling apart, needed someone to come in.
00:03:01
Speaker
The man who worked here
00:03:02
Speaker
He actually started this place.
00:03:04
Speaker
He lives on, we have 40 acres here and he's a Montana boy.
00:03:08
Speaker
And he said, I want to have a community funeral home out there in the middle of nowhere.
00:03:13
Speaker
So he decided to start a little funeral home and about a year, mortuary board came out and said, sir, that's great, but you really need a licensed mortician to run the place.
00:03:22
Speaker
So friend of a friend knew I was pretty not happy where I was and came here.
00:03:27
Speaker
And within a very short time of being the person who
00:03:32
Speaker
owned and operated Cornerstone Funeral in Boring, Oregon, I got my very first phone call of somebody wanting to bury their person on private land.
00:03:42
Speaker
And that was a whole new world for me.
00:03:45
Speaker
And I thought, you know, I started in the funeral industry because everybody in my family pretty much passed away when I was a small child.
00:03:52
Speaker
So I thought that was why I was called to this.
00:03:55
Speaker
But after being with the family and taking care of my first natural burial, I realized, no, no, no, that's really why I've been called to this work.
00:04:05
Speaker
Wow.
00:04:07
Speaker
It's one thing that I have to say really strikes me, especially a lot of the guests we have.
00:04:11
Speaker
Maybe that's not maybe I don't say it's the common denominator, but but a lot of our guests have come from various different backgrounds to the funeral space and are making their own mark in it, sort of.
00:04:25
Speaker
And it's usually
00:04:26
Speaker
born from upset or that they've seen or experienced in the business.
00:04:32
Speaker
And so it's always really interesting to sort of dig deeper into those stories.
00:04:36
Speaker
So tell us about, you know, you had this person, so you'd come from the corporate funeral world, which
00:04:42
Speaker
You know, there's lovers and haters out there of it, obviously.
00:04:46
Speaker
And, you know, you've got this gorgeous little funeral home, but you had an experience in Green Burial, I guess, to this date.
00:04:54
Speaker
And you get this phone call.
00:04:56
Speaker
I mean, what did you do?
00:04:57
Speaker
A lot of people would probably be terrified and kind of go, not for me.
00:05:00
Speaker
Bye.
Handling Non-Traditional Burial Requests
00:05:02
Speaker
I was super transparent with them.
00:05:04
Speaker
They phoned up, it was a family who had a loved one named Wanda and she lived on their communal property, which had a bunch of acreage here, an intentional community in the country.
00:05:13
Speaker
And they said they wanted to keep her there when she passed away and they wanna bury her there.
00:05:18
Speaker
And I just felt really honest with this family and said, you know, I've always worked for funeral homes where that's something we haven't done before.
00:05:25
Speaker
I said, I love the idea.
00:05:26
Speaker
I want to help you make this happen, but I'm not quite sure.
00:05:30
Speaker
So let's work together.
00:05:31
Speaker
And they were really amenable to that.
00:05:33
Speaker
So that felt like a nice welcoming to the country to begin with.
00:05:36
Speaker
hey, we're all in this together and we're going to see what we can do here.
00:05:39
Speaker
And then the idea that I still want to be their person, but I don't have all the answers and they still believed in me.
00:05:44
Speaker
So that was really reassuring.
00:05:46
Speaker
And why don't you know it, it's a super simple thing to be.
00:05:49
Speaker
And it's a really simple, it's a super simple thing to do.
00:05:54
Speaker
I happen to live in one of the United States that says you can have private land burial.
00:06:01
Speaker
I happen to be in one of the counties
00:06:03
Speaker
in this state that says backyard burial is something you can do if you fall underneath some of the little ramifications, which really is being a rural part of the town, have at least one acre.
00:06:15
Speaker
It's really not a bunch of rules.
00:06:17
Speaker
So within the next day of figuring out what they wanted, we were able to have this natural burial.
00:06:24
Speaker
And how everything unfolded with this family is we met at a local pub and we were filling out
00:06:30
Speaker
the information for the death certificate, just to kind of start off with some basic business.
00:06:34
Speaker
And they were telling me that Wanda was a woman of the earth and she was a philosopher.
00:06:40
Speaker
And we had to come up with, well, what is her occupation and what is her industry?
00:06:44
Speaker
Because that's what the death record really needs.
00:06:46
Speaker
We have to put something.
00:06:47
Speaker
So they wanted to settle on, she's just a wanderer.
00:06:51
Speaker
And they wanted her occupation to be that.
00:06:53
Speaker
And they wanted the industry to be the earth.
00:06:56
Speaker
And I thought, well, the county's probably gonna kick this back.
00:06:58
Speaker
We can try, but the county's probably not gonna go for it.
00:07:01
Speaker
And sure enough, they didn't, but we had a backup plan for what that would be.
00:07:04
Speaker
But this family was really great.
00:07:06
Speaker
They were really understanding and really amenable to the fact that what they were asking for maybe wasn't so mainstream, but the fact we could do it.
00:07:14
Speaker
We gathered a tribe of people together and it's really everybody in their community.
00:07:20
Speaker
They decided that they wanted to prepare their own space
00:07:25
Speaker
They wanted to wrap her in a quilt that she had from her early days of high school that she'd made.
00:07:32
Speaker
Her sons prepared the space.
00:07:34
Speaker
Everything really fell into place so easily.
00:07:37
Speaker
And wouldn't you know it, it was so simple just to have a backhoe and
00:07:40
Speaker
make everything happen.
00:07:42
Speaker
And getting a permit wasn't really like you're adding an extension on the deck where you have to pay all this money to the county.
00:07:48
Speaker
It was just merely part of the death certificate.
00:07:50
Speaker
So everything about it was just so moving and so beautiful.
00:07:53
Speaker
And there's just so many details and such a rich story.
00:07:56
Speaker
I would just definitely love to share it.
00:07:58
Speaker
I'm glad that you're open and interested in it.
00:08:01
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely.
00:08:02
Speaker
I mean, it's fascinating because my dad, when I sat down to do a pre-plan with my my mom and that was we went through that process.
00:08:11
Speaker
And then I tried to sit down with my dad and my dad just kept batting me away and sort of saying, you know, I just want you to throw me in the backyard.
00:08:18
Speaker
And I'm like.
00:08:19
Speaker
I don't think that's quite legal, Dad, but okay.
00:08:22
Speaker
And so it is, it's interesting.
00:08:25
Speaker
I mean, obviously it's going to be country to country.
00:08:26
Speaker
It's going to have different rules and regulations and stuff.
00:08:29
Speaker
But do you know offhand how many states in the US permit?
00:08:33
Speaker
Yeah.
00:08:34
Speaker
So there's about 45 that will allow some part of burial.
00:08:38
Speaker
Now, it's very strict where even though a state says, yes, we have some rules on the book that are open, it really depends on where you are.
00:08:46
Speaker
Interestingly enough, I'm on the West Coast and right above me is Washington and right below me is California, which you would think are very liberal states.
00:08:53
Speaker
Our cremation rate is really high.
00:08:55
Speaker
Our natural burial rate, our aqua cremation rate is high.
00:08:58
Speaker
We have a real interest in the natural organic reduction, but those two states say no private land burial.
00:09:06
Speaker
The state above me in Washington, there's a little bit of wiggle room if you happen to own your own island.
00:09:13
Speaker
And that's not so ostentatious, seeing there's lots of little islands around there.
00:09:17
Speaker
But just in general, they've made it pretty difficult for the average person who wants to do that.
Natural Burial Practices and Community Involvement
00:09:22
Speaker
So I just tell people, always be legal, always be ethical, and check in and see if your local funeral home doesn't know, pick up the phone and call another funeral home.
00:09:32
Speaker
And
00:09:33
Speaker
It's not always just the private funeral homes who know these things.
00:09:37
Speaker
A lot of corporations and people who work there want to help families do what they want to do.
00:09:43
Speaker
It just depends on are they educated in it?
00:09:45
Speaker
Have they done their own reading?
00:09:46
Speaker
Is there any training?
00:09:48
Speaker
And there is a funeral director for you, some town you're in that will have the right answers.
00:09:54
Speaker
So just make the calls, ask the questions.
00:09:56
Speaker
The internet is a great resource.
00:09:59
Speaker
Green Burial Council is there.
00:10:00
Speaker
The National Home Funeral Alliance is there.
00:10:04
Speaker
And there's a lot of great links that hopefully we can put in the show notes so people can take a look and see what they can do for themselves.
00:10:10
Speaker
Yeah, it's amazing.
00:10:12
Speaker
Yeah, it's like, it's not that it's something I haven't thought about in the 15 years I've been doing this, but like, I guess I hadn't, I kind of had dismissed it that it was possible because it does, it just seems so out there, you know, because I guess you hear of like murderers and serial killers burying in the backyard and stuff like that.
00:10:36
Speaker
So I guess it just brings...
00:10:39
Speaker
ideas into your head and so it's amazing to know that it's actually a very natural very eco-friendly be you're not you know I don't want to say but you're not paying into the corporations and the cemeteries and all of that sort of stuff and not that there's anything wrong with them but if that's not what you want to do in your last rituals then that's fine but yeah it's there's something kind of beautiful about it I mean
00:11:06
Speaker
you know, if my dad could be buried in our backyard, I mean, I think I'm getting him cremated anyway, but, you know, like it's, it's interesting.
00:11:16
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:16
Speaker
I never would have.
00:11:17
Speaker
Now, one of the biggest problems, I guess I would foresee, and I guess, you know, again, I like to voice the Joe public on the street is what if you move house?
00:11:29
Speaker
Well, then you need to disclose that when you move.
00:11:32
Speaker
I tell families when they're looking to do this, let's walk the property together.
00:11:37
Speaker
Let's figure out what's the best place because you might have 20, 30, 40 acres.
00:11:41
Speaker
But what if the area you're going to is going to be hard to dig?
00:11:45
Speaker
The soil is going to be too soft.
00:11:47
Speaker
Things are going to collapse once you dig them.
00:11:49
Speaker
You're going to be too close to a waterway, to electric, to the neighbors outbuilding, all those things.
00:11:54
Speaker
So finding this specific place and then actually maybe drawing a map of the property and putting a little indicator where that is, maybe filing that with the deed or the title company just so in case something happens.
00:12:06
Speaker
where there's a natural disaster, everybody in the house passes.
00:12:11
Speaker
Whatever it is that the person with the keeper of the information sort of forgets what blackberry bush grandma is buried under, it's important to have the records of these things and disclose it.
00:12:22
Speaker
Now, I know Poltergeist was a huge movie back in the day, and that was one where people really were crazy.
00:12:27
Speaker
creeped out, for lack of a better term, of the idea of living next to a cemetery, having somebody buried possibly under that concrete where your swimming pool is, and it was sort of a thing.
00:12:38
Speaker
Well, I think the vibe, I think the vibration, I think all of that has changed greatly where people are more accepting to that idea.
00:12:45
Speaker
There's more conversations about death, about dying, about grief.
00:12:49
Speaker
All of this is coming up.
Changing Perceptions on Burial Methods
00:12:51
Speaker
We're changing things even in the funeral industry where we have the end-of-life doula.
00:12:55
Speaker
And we have the home funeral guide.
00:12:56
Speaker
And we're starting to have much more conversation, public libraries, death cafes.
00:13:01
Speaker
And people are getting that it's not just serial killers that bury somebody in their yard or in the woods.
00:13:07
Speaker
We want to be ethical.
00:13:09
Speaker
It's not kicking dad in a hole in the yard.
00:13:12
Speaker
We're gently laying somebody into the embrace of the earth.
00:13:19
Speaker
No, it's very cool.
00:13:22
Speaker
I mean, it would definitely be something I would be interested in, for sure.
00:13:27
Speaker
I think there's something really personal and beautiful about it.
00:13:31
Speaker
It's just... Yeah, I guess it's not something I...
00:13:35
Speaker
Again, it's because of the media.
00:13:37
Speaker
It's because of it's sort of like when I started questioning things way back when I started, like embalming.
00:13:43
Speaker
It's like, you know, certain traditions are done just automatically.
00:13:47
Speaker
And so therefore, the public just assume, oh, well, if that's always what's been done, then that must be the way to do it.
00:13:54
Speaker
And that's where.
00:13:55
Speaker
I think educating the public on topics like this is huge and paramount.
00:14:01
Speaker
And as you said, opening that conversation and just letting people know what their options are if they are interested in something like that.
00:14:10
Speaker
And as you said, like, you know, not every state, not every location is going to allow for it.
00:14:14
Speaker
But if it is something that somebody wants,
00:14:16
Speaker
then I do think it is up to a funeral director.
00:14:19
Speaker
I think it's part of their responsibility to look into that.
00:14:23
Speaker
So, you know, well done you for doing it.
00:14:25
Speaker
Now, was that the start of your green journey or and how has it progressed since, I guess?
00:14:31
Speaker
So that was really the start.
00:14:32
Speaker
So the day was just so lovely.
00:14:36
Speaker
They lived in this huge makeshift sort of teepee tent type
00:14:43
Speaker
place and everything was just what you would think about with the wonderful oh the quilting and the batik and the pillows and it was just really I didn't know what that was I'd never been to something necessarily I don't know if it was more of a gypsy feeling or just sort of a natural feeling just something very communal about it was really lovely people were kind and
00:15:04
Speaker
There was a lot of everybody wanted to take part in it.
00:15:07
Speaker
Nobody was scared.
00:15:09
Speaker
Everybody was welcome opening.
00:15:10
Speaker
We were definitely all together and we were talking about things such as where she was resting and was she resting properly.
00:15:18
Speaker
And they had some ice.
00:15:19
Speaker
I instructed them because I did some reading at that point.
00:15:21
Speaker
Wasn't quite sure, but I knew some form of ice would be OK.
00:15:24
Speaker
Dried ice.
00:15:25
Speaker
has off-gassing, so they had some basic ice that they could have in the fridge and the plastic packs.
00:15:31
Speaker
We live in the middle of nowhere, so the idea of getting the cooling blanket or getting some of that stuff wasn't really, you know, we're just going to go to the local, you know, store and get what's there.
00:15:39
Speaker
And we strategically moved some things around, and it was a learning process.
00:15:43
Speaker
And how do we make her mouth closed?
00:15:45
Speaker
And how do we keep her eyes closed?
00:15:47
Speaker
And again, things we're trying to figure out is when the first time you do it, you have to be gentle on yourself.
00:15:54
Speaker
You're learning these things as you go.
00:15:56
Speaker
what happens if somebody has a little bit of a bowel movement like she did?
00:15:59
Speaker
What happens?
00:15:59
Speaker
And everybody sort of turned to me because again, who they look at as sort of the funeral professional in the room, but they also were caretaking her.
00:16:08
Speaker
And people just organically, generally were able to get a sponge and get it wet and kind of stroke and bathe and perfume and get some oils.
00:16:17
Speaker
And there was some
00:16:18
Speaker
knock chompa incense in the air.
00:16:20
Speaker
Somebody picked up a guitar and strummed it.
00:16:22
Speaker
Somebody decided to be able to put somebody on speakerphone, some relatives from back East who could actually
00:16:30
Speaker
talk even though she wasn't coherent at the very end, but they could at least talk to her.
00:16:33
Speaker
They could visualize, see her.
00:16:35
Speaker
Her sons were able to come in little by little from wherever they lived in the country and prepare the space.
00:16:40
Speaker
And it was so hands-on and it was so beautiful like that.
00:16:43
Speaker
Somebody cooks because people are going to come and everybody falls into place of what they need to do.
00:16:48
Speaker
It's really interesting.
00:16:50
Speaker
I just put a post on Instagram the other day of being at a family's house.
00:16:55
Speaker
And it was really the same sort of idea.
00:16:57
Speaker
People instinctually know, oh, I guess I should clean the toilets because people are going to come by.
00:17:02
Speaker
Or maybe I should move the cars outside so guests have a place to park.
00:17:06
Speaker
Or, you know, maybe we should let's, you know.
00:17:10
Speaker
make this person so their modesty is intact and maybe somebody needs to get some music started.
00:17:16
Speaker
So it's sort of like this little organic party that comes together.
00:17:20
Speaker
So after the burial, we all stood out there and we all held hands around her little grave space.
00:17:26
Speaker
And we just, there was some chanting and some song singing and people talking about her kindness and her love.
00:17:32
Speaker
And it was so real to me.
00:17:33
Speaker
And I hadn't been part of that sort of a ceremony before.
00:17:36
Speaker
I'd always been to a cemetery where there's a lowering device, there's a casket,
00:17:42
Speaker
The priest or whomever might say a word or two, the caskets lower, people walk away from the grave.
00:17:46
Speaker
People didn't really put the soil back in the space or didn't linger because the cemetery needed to bury somebody else.
00:17:54
Speaker
It wasn't really what you did.
00:17:55
Speaker
You went to the next hall or wherever that you're going to have your meal.
00:17:59
Speaker
And these people had their meal while we were doing things.
00:18:02
Speaker
It was just so much more...
00:18:04
Speaker
It just felt right.
00:18:05
Speaker
It just felt great.
00:18:06
Speaker
There was something very hands-on.
00:18:07
Speaker
It's what I always felt was missing.
00:18:09
Speaker
And as a small child thinking, oh, I want to, at 13, I knew I wanted to work in a funeral home, but I didn't know what that looked like because you're 13.
00:18:17
Speaker
But I always thought I'd be helping people through their grief.
00:18:20
Speaker
And when I worked at funeral homes, it was always upselling people on merchandise.
00:18:23
Speaker
It was having sales meetings.
00:18:25
Speaker
And it was doing these things where I thought, did I have a really naive dream of what I thought being in the funeral world would be?
00:18:33
Speaker
Is this what this is?
00:18:34
Speaker
I really thought that I would be there and be kind and just give.
00:18:38
Speaker
So this day allowed me to do those things that I always, I could just help wherever.
00:18:42
Speaker
And if it was me, you know, helping and stirring the chili or it was doing whatever, I could do it.
00:18:47
Speaker
And it just felt lovely.
00:18:48
Speaker
So as I drove home, I thought,
00:18:50
Speaker
Yeah, this is it.
00:18:52
Speaker
Now, in a very short period of time, I started getting the phone calls from people saying,
00:18:56
Speaker
are you that person that buries people in their yards?
00:18:59
Speaker
And are you that green funeral person?
00:19:02
Speaker
And I guess I said, yes, I guess I am.
00:19:05
Speaker
And yes, so I learned all I could.
00:19:07
Speaker
I read everything I could, studied everything I could.
00:19:11
Speaker
There was some information, some interviews.
00:19:12
Speaker
I mean, this isn't a new concept.
00:19:14
Speaker
Green burial is not a trend.
00:19:16
Speaker
This has been around 150 years now.
00:19:18
Speaker
People have had home burials.
00:19:20
Speaker
All of this happened before the funeral industry took off.
00:19:22
Speaker
So there was a lot of information about caring,
00:19:25
Speaker
for the deceased and being able to do things.
00:19:28
Speaker
So I really wanted to follow the rules and get everything correct.
00:19:31
Speaker
I am also about a half an hour from the state of Washington.
00:19:35
Speaker
So I thought it was really important to know everything I could about Oregon and Washington's rules.
00:19:39
Speaker
And that's what I behoove people, anybody in the funeral industry listening to this, know your state's rules.
00:19:44
Speaker
Can families act as their own funeral director?
00:19:47
Speaker
New York, where you are?
00:19:49
Speaker
No.
00:19:50
Speaker
Oregon, where I am?
00:19:51
Speaker
You betcha.
00:19:52
Speaker
Somebody can transport their person.
00:19:54
Speaker
They can get the death certificate signed.
00:19:56
Speaker
They can provide cooling for their person.
00:19:58
Speaker
They can drive their person to the crematory or to the cemetery.
00:20:01
Speaker
They can do whatever they'd like.
00:20:02
Speaker
And so it's good to be able to know and to guide and have these things.
00:20:06
Speaker
So that's how my green life started.
00:20:08
Speaker
My home funeral life started that way.
00:20:12
Speaker
And my green funeral life started that way.
00:20:14
Speaker
And allowing people to come and stay the night in my funeral home when they're visiting people or having bathings here and dressings, it just opened the door wide because I realized this is what the community wants and I'm going to give them what they want.
00:20:28
Speaker
Wow, that's amazing.
00:20:29
Speaker
That's very powerful words there.
00:20:35
Speaker
You're so right.
00:20:39
Speaker
The industry has lost itself a little bit.
00:20:42
Speaker
I get poo-pooed for using the word industry and I'm like, well, hmm.
00:20:46
Speaker
It's a business.
00:20:48
Speaker
It is an industry.
00:20:48
Speaker
I mean, you can say death care or end of life care, but it is an industry.
00:20:53
Speaker
And my time in the funeral industry being the corporate industry, I'm so thankful I had those years.
00:20:58
Speaker
I'm so thankful I learned the things I did.
00:21:01
Speaker
I also worked for the Catholic Church for a long time at the cemeteries.
00:21:04
Speaker
So thankful because I could incorporate that into what I do now and know that this is the path for me and have that understanding of it, but also appreciate the time I was there.
00:21:17
Speaker
Yeah.
00:21:17
Speaker
Now for, do you just do focus on green now or do you, are you still working in that funeral home and do a bit of everything?
Offering Green Funeral Services
00:21:27
Speaker
But your sort of your online media persona is green and you do it when you can or is it just green?
00:21:37
Speaker
I'm full service, baby.
00:21:39
Speaker
I am a licensed mortician and whatever you need.
00:21:42
Speaker
I don't embalm people.
00:21:43
Speaker
Embalming was never my interest.
00:21:45
Speaker
Even when I started 32 years ago, that was not what I wanted to do.
00:21:49
Speaker
And I knew that.
00:21:50
Speaker
And so I didn't follow that path.
00:21:52
Speaker
But at my funeral home, I allow families anything they want.
00:21:55
Speaker
I provide them with all the choices and they choose whatever they want.
00:22:00
Speaker
And if they do want embalming, I have somebody who I can get them to to take care of that for them.
00:22:06
Speaker
If they do want a metal casket, they want whatever they need.
00:22:09
Speaker
Again, it's not about me.
00:22:10
Speaker
It's not about my agenda.
00:22:12
Speaker
It's about the family and what they want.
00:22:14
Speaker
So we have these things.
00:22:15
Speaker
I have a full price list that has everything from burial at sea to standard cremation to the natural burial to anything.
00:22:24
Speaker
So...
00:22:25
Speaker
I'm known for taking care of families a natural way.
00:22:28
Speaker
I'd say a lot of families come to me that want the aqua cremation, want the natural organic reduction, want the green burial.
00:22:35
Speaker
So I'm really proud to say I'm not necessarily a green internet funeral director, or I'm not just showing pictures and educating.
00:22:42
Speaker
I'm actually doing it on a day-to-day basis, but I also have plenty of families that want a standard flame cremation.
00:22:48
Speaker
I'm on the West Coast and we're at 80% cremation rate.
00:22:52
Speaker
And a lot of those families come to me and that's fantastic.
00:22:55
Speaker
And I cheer them on and take care of what they need.
00:22:58
Speaker
I always love to introduce the idea of shades of green, like maybe what they're going to do with the ashes after the fact.
00:23:06
Speaker
And I don't mean become a tree because as we're learning, that's not necessarily a reality, but better ways to possibly, if they want to,
00:23:16
Speaker
put them in a garden or they want to scatter them, give them some better options for the environment of what to do with that.
00:23:22
Speaker
I've made a bunch of urns out of dryer lint that I've been able to give families and just encouraging them to recycle something that they have in their home to go ahead and put the ashes in or different ways to have a ceremony.
00:23:35
Speaker
And just if they want a direct cremation, it doesn't mean they can't come to the funeral home and bathe their person or visit their person or
00:23:43
Speaker
More importantly, keep their person in the nursing home, at the family home, have your visitation there, have the ceremony, have all those things, and then call me when it's ready for me to come get them and bring them into our care for either the cooling or the cremation process.
00:23:59
Speaker
Happy to do that.
00:24:00
Speaker
So letting families know, even though this is your form of disposition, there's plenty of ways to celebrate that life.
00:24:07
Speaker
And other things we can do to be green, recycle paper for memorial folders,
00:24:12
Speaker
How about the idea of not everybody driving their own car?
00:24:15
Speaker
Let's all carpool.
00:24:17
Speaker
So we're figuring it out.
00:24:19
Speaker
Oregon is pretty hip and cool when it comes to really reusing, repurposing and all that.
00:24:24
Speaker
So it really, I don't have to beat anybody over the head with what I'm trying to tell them.
00:24:32
Speaker
I get a real good feeling, you know, being around death and dying for 32 years, you get a good feeling when the family comes in.
00:24:38
Speaker
what would make them happy and what they want.
00:24:40
Speaker
People have a general idea, guide them.
00:24:43
Speaker
Some people don't know, and I can give them all the options.
00:24:46
Speaker
And so families that have no idea what the heck they want, I'll say, well, did you know these are some things we can do in the state of Oregon?
00:24:52
Speaker
And I list out all the forms of disposition and they say, wait, wait, go back to that composting thing.
00:24:58
Speaker
What was that water cremation?
00:25:00
Speaker
And we have conversations and more times than not, the family says, that sounds kind of good.
00:25:04
Speaker
I think I'll do that.
00:25:05
Speaker
I didn't know about that.
00:25:06
Speaker
It's education.
00:25:07
Speaker
And really what it is, my darling, love.
00:25:10
Speaker
We are all in this because we love people and it's just spreading the love.
00:25:16
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:17
Speaker
Well, I think that is an absolutely wonderful way to end.
00:25:21
Speaker
And thank you for that last piece that you just said there.
00:25:25
Speaker
There's some top tips in there for people, whether it's, you know, you have the remains and you want to memorialize, as you said, the shades of green.
00:25:33
Speaker
I love that.
00:25:34
Speaker
That's a great line because it really is.
00:25:37
Speaker
It doesn't have to be doing everything in totality.
00:25:40
Speaker
As we all know, even, you know, recycling ourselves in our homes, it can be just small little steps that will help to
00:25:46
Speaker
Every little bit helps.
00:25:48
Speaker
And so I love that idea.
00:25:49
Speaker
And it does.
00:25:50
Speaker
It really is all about love.
00:25:51
Speaker
And it's about meeting the families where they're at in that time.
00:25:54
Speaker
And rather than putting your agenda and your ego and your, you know, must hit sales on somebody, it's really about listening to them and hearing what they have to say.
00:26:04
Speaker
And
Conclusion and Appreciation
00:26:05
Speaker
so that's brilliant.
00:26:05
Speaker
Thank you so much for coming on the show, sharing your story and equally educating us on the shades of green, the 50 shades of green that we've got.
00:26:15
Speaker
I love this.
00:26:15
Speaker
I really do.
00:26:17
Speaker
It's amazing.
00:26:18
Speaker
So thank you so much, Elizabeth.
00:26:20
Speaker
Thank you for your interest.
00:26:32
Speaker
Well, there was another episode of the Glam Reaper podcast.
00:26:35
Speaker
I hope you enjoyed it.
00:26:37
Speaker
I'm wondering, are you going to green your funeral or memorial in some teeny tiny way?
00:26:42
Speaker
Let us know in the comments or send us an email at glamreaperpodcast at gmail.com.
00:26:47
Speaker
And we'll talk to you again soon.