Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2021/01/19/human-body-composting-services-up-and-running-in-washington-state.html
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If they don’t name this new business “Compost Mortem” then what are they even doing.
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This is great! Since I was a kid and we had those, “what do you want to happen to your body after you die,” conversations, I’ve always wanted to be composted and a tree planted with my compost. Ideally one that kids will climb on, like I did as a kid. Or just read under.
This could help with that cremation-related air quality issue they’re anticipating in LA, due to all the COVID bodies, too.
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Burial at sea can have a similar effect, with the added bonus of (probably) sequestering some of your carbon.
I actually like this idea.
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I’d rather have a sky burial, buzzards and all, but sadly nobody in my family is willing to chop me up into little pieces.
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As a decrepit Washingtonian this strikes me as quite resonant with our general worldview. Every state ought to characterize itself with its own method of body resolution; just think, Hawaii: tipped into a volcano, Florida: gators, North Dakota: uh… wood chipper? …
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Fascism ain’t pretty.
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Surely there are funeral homes that would offer that service, and handy cellphone towers everywhere.
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Bringing new meaning to the term “funeral reception.”
Could be the worst call of your life, bar none.
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No, you should get at least four bars. If not, you really need to change your cell carrier.
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I have to work this into the crime novel I am writing in my head.
A funeral home which takes bodies from organized criminals to compost. I can even make the nonsense pitch to the producers:
“Six Feet Under meets the Sopranos”.
You could just be buried and plant a tree on top. Slow release and quicker and easier to do than being composted first.
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Yeah, that’s not legal anyplace I’ve ever resided. The composting seems to be an important step. 
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He’s uglier on the inside.
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Hamlet: How long will a man lie i’ the earth ere he rot?
Gravedigger: Faith, if he be not rotten before he die—as we have many pocky corses nowadays that will scarce hold the laying in— he will last you some eight year or nine year.
– W. Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act 5 Scene 1
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Actually the key to the process is zero embalming and no cremation. If burial at sea includes either of those then it is nothing like what is going on in Washington State.
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Looking forward to this process starting on the east coast. Shipping an un-embalmed body cross country would kind of defeat the environmental gains. If that is even legal.
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More or less what I had in mind. Wrap me naked in a cloth bag with something heavy (like a big rock), then push me overboard somewhere midocean, or at least a few miles out to sea so my parts don’t wash up and traumatize the children. Feed the fish, feed the crabs, become fish poop, make my way down to the bottom of the ocean.
Probably not legal, of course.
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I did this with my dog’s body. We dug a 6-foot hole with a backhoe, and put her body in it, then filled the hole with the existing overburden soil.
Then we planted an Asian pear on it.
Which died.
Turns out that anaerobic decomposition is not something tree roots love, and the carbon-nitrogen ratio in the soil got badly off-balance. Lots of things I planted died in that location. I even tried to drive pipe down into the perimeter to get some better air-exchange (nitrogen, oxygen) down to the problem area, but nothing helped.
So I don’t recommend at least assuming that all locations on this planet are going to work for the ol’ “bury me and plant a rosebush on me” etc. Local soil conditions and soil biota vary wildly depending on locale.
Further, even professionals can get it wrong, with calamitous, lengthy and widespread consequences …
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