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My wish is to be creamated and have my ashes sprinkled around a majestic native tree. I hope they'll work the soil and plant daisies and native flowers.
My wish is to be creamated and have my ashes sprinkled around a majestic native tree. I hope they'll work the soil and plant daisies and native flowers.
That sounds really beautiful.
Like many have said, I would like to be returned to nature. Cremation seems like a very "clean" way to go too. I don't care a whit about having a grave site for people to go stand in front of maybe two or three times in their life.
Yes, thank you - you are exactly right. And I do have so many photos of the place. What a good idea to put them all in a book! I am going to do that one of these days - maybe a rainy, cold winter weekend. That sounds very, very positive to me.
My daughter in law makes books for everything, it's so nice! I don't know which website she uses, but she uploads all the photos, writes a little bit about each photo and then gets a nice book. I would love to do that but I haven't been able to make the time.
Love your whole post about the farm. Made me wish all the grandkids and great grandkids lived near my mom and the home we grew up in, but like your family, we're spread out from coast to coast. My kids are making new happy memories for their families where they live. Life. Happy and sad at the same time.
My daughter in law makes books for everything, it's so nice! I don't know which website she uses, but she uploads all the photos, writes a little bit about each photo and then gets a nice book. I would love to do that but I haven't been able to make the time.
Love your whole post about the farm. Made me wish all the grandkids and great grandkids lived near my mom and the home we grew up in, but like your family, we're spread out from coast to coast. My kids are making new happy memories for their families where they live. Life. Happy and sad at the same time.
Happy and sad is right. Time marches on and we can't allow the past to override our joy in the present. I have had to learn to live in the present - not with sadness about the past or worry about the future. It's a daily discipline for me to focus my "living energy" on the moment I am in, rather than looking forward or backward, both of which can keep me awake at night!
One thing that really helps me is this: I love where we live. I love our neighborhood, and it's full of families of all types and ages and stages in their lives. It's a happy neighborhood and I have a peaceful house. But three houses up the street from me is a house where a very elderly woman lives - also apparently happily because she has lots of family over often. Get this - she got this house "for free" because she sold all this land, which was a family farm originally, to the developer and one of the deals she made was that he build her a house for free, which he did. So, she sits at the top of the hill in a house that overlooks a bustling neighborhood - on land that had been in her family for 100 years from what I hear. I'm sure it looks nothing like her memories. But I also know that our neighborhood is beautiful and a happy place filled with kids, dogs, bicycles, walkers, a little library hut, a park area, etc. Is it an improvement or not? Who knows - but it is what it is and personally I'm happy about it, and I hope she is too. Apparently it hasn't bothered her to continue living here, with all the change all around her.
When I met with the buyers last week, I left that meeting feeling so much better. It's a multigenerational family who is buying the bulk of the property. Parents, grandparents and adult kids all pooled their money and plan to build on the property. It will be teeming with three generations of a family and they plan to live out there. That's what this place needs and it will be better off. It will get new life breathed into it. And I can move forward with my life instead of continuing to sift through the past. Those days are numbered now! I'm going to put that book together though probably some time this winter, and then I can just look back on it when I want to, I can pick and choose the memories, and it will be on my terms and from a comfortable place, not with the feeling like I am being burdened and stressed.
Happy and sad is right. Time marches on and we can't allow the past to override our joy in the present. I have had to learn to live in the present - not with sadness about the past or worry about the future. It's a daily discipline for me to focus my "living energy" on the moment I am in, rather than looking forward or backward, both of which can keep me awake at night!
When I met with the buyers last week, I left that meeting feeling so much better. It's a multigenerational family who is buying the bulk of the property. Parents, grandparents and adult kids all pooled their money and plan to build on the property. It will be teeming with three generations of a family and they plan to live out there. That's what this place needs and it will be better off. It will get new life breathed into it. And I can move forward with my life instead of continuing to sift through the past. Those days are numbered now! I'm going to put that book together though probably some time this winter, and then I can just look back on it when I want to, I can pick and choose the memories, and it will be on my terms and from a comfortable place, not with the feeling like I am being burdened and stressed.
I think you will feel really good about it when it's over, especially since you like the buyers and will be able to think back on your good memories.
When my husband sold his parents' house, it was to a family friend that they liked. Although his parents would have wanted us to keep the house (and move into it ourselves even though we have our own house), we are glad that it went to people my in laws liked. A relative of my in laws (who they did not care for) also wanted to buy it, so we feel good that we did not sell it to her!
The only sad thing (to some in my husband's family) is that my MIL was very neat and this new family...not so much. My MIL would not be happy to see stuff all over the yard. But the house belongs to the new family now and they are enjoying it - and my husband and I are glad.
Like many have said, I would like to be returned to nature. Cremation seems like a very "clean" way to go too. I don't care a whit about having a grave site for people to go stand in front of maybe two or three times in their life.
Like many have said, I would like to be returned to nature. Cremation seems like a very "clean" way to go too. I don't care a whit about having a grave site for people to go stand in front of maybe two or three times in their life.
Oh my gosh, things just got really, really crunk with my dad's estate probate, the upcoming sale of land, which is in numerous parcels and various forms of ownership. Don't even get me started on the various tax ramifications between my mom (the heir) and the estate. The CPA actually asked me what my dad paid for the land and when. How would I know all this? He inherited some of it, he bought some at rock bottom prices probably below appraised value from various cousins, there have been ongoing expenses that were tax deductible, but some weren't because he lived there for several years but then moved a few years ago - but there was a business on part of it - my head is about to explode.
The transaction with the Texas property was so easy and went so smoothly from a paperwork perspective, I guess I was lulled into a false sense of security. Now we're down to the wire and suddenly everything is at a standstill and everyone is looking at me going, "So...where's all this information?"
IN MY DAD'S HEAD AND HE'S DEAD NOW. And my mom has no idea what was bought when and how much he paid for various parcels of land. This information is not on deeds - I mean, I guess the YEAR is on the deeds, but my parents have changed banks numerous times over the years. I guess I could get the deeds from the title company? Who knows. Of course, pay for that research. Then pay the CPA to look back on those years and see what my dad reported as the price of the land. Then pay the CPA to figure out what expenses could be deducted from the appreciation. Then pay the CPA to tell my mom how much to put back for taxes on appreciation over the past 20 years.
Of course, this also means that ONE check will be made out to the estate. ONE check. And of course my mom has to open up an estate account for that ONE check to be deposited into. And then ONE check will be written on that estate account, for the 2017 estate tax return - if any taxes are owed and I'm sure they will be. Meanwhile, I'm also sure that the bank will be paid to maintain that account too.
OMG. Why is all this so freaking complicated? My head is not big enough for all these details.
So let's see - hopefully my mom will have a nest egg left over after she pays the CPAs in two states, the Title Company, the real estate broker, the foundation repair folks, and the IRS. Oh, and I just got another hospital bill in, nearly 9 months after my dad passed away! WHAT THE HECK. Surely they can do better than that.
Oh, Kathryn, I'm so sorry about all that. What a mess. But you will get through it one step at a time. Your father probably never realized that he should have kept careful records of all that stuff.
We received a doctor bill for my FIL several years after he had died. We just ignored it and haven't had a problem so far. Nine months is bad, too, but I'd probably go ahead and pay that one. Yes, they should do better than that.
Oh, Kathryn, I'm so sorry about all that. What a mess. But you will get through it one step at a time. Your father probably never realized that he should have kept careful records of all that stuff.
We received a doctor bill for my FIL several years after he had died. We just ignored it and haven't had a problem so far. Nine months is bad, too, but I'd probably go ahead and pay that one. Yes, they should do better than that.
Well, get this - I just called about it and they said the reason it came out so late is because Medicare deemed it "medically unnecessary" and kicked it back to them. Yeah, that's right - a cranial MRI on a guy admitted with a stroke is "medically unnecessary?" I don't think so. Neither did the woman I talked to, who said don't pay it because she was going to call them and resubmit it most likely.
Sheeze!
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