Beyond the Grave
If you’ve ever flown into New York’s LaGuardia airport, you’ve likely seen the rolling hills of Mount Hebron and Cedar Grove cemeteries. Wedged between routes 495 and 678, you get a closer view of the rows and rows of headstones during the drive into New York City. One thing you might not see a lot of: people. That’s because the cemetery is no longer central — or practical — to how many memorialize our loved ones. So fields of headstones sit, no visitors in sight.
The truth is, cemeteries are often a blight upon our society. There, I said it.
No one wants to build homes near them. When they get full — and can no longer be a significant income source for the owner — the state is required to maintain the land with taxpayer’s dollars.
In 1831, the first “rural” cemetery was begun in the US; a local doctor was concerned about the unhealthiness of burying people under the church (and running out of space). Over the years, the cemetery structure has remained relatively unchanged — and yet the world has changed dramatically.
Where once families and friends would reside within a tight knit local radius, we now live in a world where travel is common and cost-effective — and families spread out. They move to other countries. Burying someone “locally” is what is often done, yet that doesn’t equate to more visitation.
This — combined with shifts in religious views- accounts for why 50% of people are being cremated; a trend that is expected to rise to nearly 70% by 2025. The other (maybe much more important) reason, is because we live in a world where people’s lives are full of deep and broad experiences. Burial is one dimensional, spreading ashes is a search for something with more dimension.
Then we come to death and the digital generation. We’ve all been part of the fleeting 72-hour memoriam on Facebook, chock full of well-intended statements and heartfelt condolences. And and we’ve all checked that deceased person’s page a year later with either hope that it’s continued to evolve (it likely hasn’t) or fascination and wonderment about how that person’s life just froze in time. By 2065 it’s projected there will be more dead people on Facebook than living. What then?
The net is we’re at an incredibly large infection point. Outdated traditions and a demand for future needs. It’s time for our loved ones to be celebrated and memorialized long after they are gone, in a vivid three dimensional view. And more importantly, for the dead to feel present in our lives. Not in a creepy ghoulish way (see this amazing episode of Black Mirror). And, no, we haven’t found the pill for immortality.
Banksy tossed this little gem out there:
“there are two times you die, once when you stop breathing, and the second, a bit later on, when somebody mentions your name for the last time.”
When we succeed in reframing death — in moving beyond the graveyard and cremation and digital breadcrumbs to fully dynamic digital memories delivered when you need them most — you may indeed stop breathing, but your name will never be mentioned for the last time.
