[Magdalen] Floating ashes.

[M J _Mike_ Logsdon]

>>>A local crematorium has been running a helpful ad in the vicinity of the 
obits lately - "helpful tips", one of which was take the ashes out of the 
plastic bag and then put them back into the urn or container *before* having 
a burial at sea.... (otherwise they float : ( <<<

I'm sure many long years ago I told this story, but it certainly bears repeating now.  It's about my "first funeral".

I'd been ordained ORC for maybe a few weeks, maybe a couple of months, when a co-worker came in from a site visit at the Salinas Rivermouth with a "mystery!"  It was a bronze-looking square box she found floating in the water, not far from the ocean proper, that she said she was going to open up to see what was in it.  The people I was in a meeting with from our section, including our boss, all looked at black-shirted me (I was doing that; palm smack to forehead):  "Uh,... Mike?"  "It bodes ill, what ******** says...."  Said person went out to the back of the building with the box, and a hammer.  Soon, she came in to announce what she'd discovered.  It was placed in an empty file cabinet with little fanfare so as to not alarm the natives.  The next day, the head of our division at that time set aside some time for him, me, and the Unnamed for a "service" in his office.  I of course used a black stole (I was that way), and read every part of the St Joseph Missal that I could justify reading, only because I had no idea what this person had already had done, so I covered my bases.  Later, division chief went out back and riveted it shut again, AFTER filling it with rocks.  (It had probably been thrown in the ocean near the rivermouth, and simply floated back in.)  It was then presented to me in a paper sack for safekeeping at home in my altar (without my mother's knowledge; still paying alimony at that time), pending the return from a Fiji surfing vacation of our maintenance superintendent.  When he returned, I took him aside, and said "Rusty, I got a favor you need to do for me."  My good-humored Japanese atheist friend said with a smile, "Sure Mike! Whadaya want me to do?"  A few days later, Russ paddled on his board about 500 yards out from the Moss Landing Jetty, and put our Unnamed friend into a proper, relatively permananent, watery resting place.  I'm sure s/he was looking down on it all, and hopefully smiling.  If not, hey, it was your own loved ones who thought tossing you into high tide at the Salinas Rivermouth was a good idea, not mine!