Becoming Clinical Waste.

Following the discovery of the grave that I reported in a recent post, I did a bit of digging on the internet today (like the pun?) I came across a guide written by a man who’d researched the law on such matters, and it seems there are three fundamental facts that apply:

1) There’s no law requiring that a body be buried in consecrated ground. All that’s required is the landowner’s permission, which means you can be buried in your own garden if you like, as long as it’s your property.

2) The only grounds on which the local authority can object are (a) if they can demonstrate that the body (which is legally deemed ‘clinical waste’) poses a pollution threat to the water table, or (b) if the cause of death is on a list of virulent diseases such as typhus or anthrax that are now virtually extinct in western, developed countries.

3) There must be at least thirty inches of earth between the top of the body and the surface of the ground.

So, since I would quite like to stay in this area but don’t own my own house, I went to see Sarah’s mother today and put the question to her.

‘How would you feel about having a body in your garden?’

‘A body? What sort of a body?’

‘A human body. A dead one.’

‘Whose dead body?’

‘Mine.’

‘But you’re not dead.’

‘No, I know, but I will be one day and I’d quite like to stay around here. You’re the only person I know who owns a house in the vicinity.’

‘Are you completely mad?’

‘I expect so, but that’s beside the point. The point is, I wouldn’t be any trouble. I suppose it would be a bit of a nuisance having to rotovate around me, and you might feel uneasy about planting root vegetables there, and I daresay you’d want to stop the dog burying her bone on the spot just in case she retrieved more than she’d put in, but apart from that I’d be very quiet. You’d forget I was there after a while.’

‘No, I wouldn’t. I’d have to put with friends and relations swanning around my garden with flowers and things. They’d interrupt my afternoon tea.’

‘Oh, yes. Never thought of that.’

‘And have you given due consideration to the possibility of polluting my water table?’

‘No.’

‘And don’t you think it might upset Sarah? She has a delicate constitution, you know.’

‘But you could put a seat next to the grave. She could wile away the summer evenings engaged in conversation with me.’

‘Conversation?’

‘Well, she could talk and I could pretend I was listening.’

‘I see. One final question. Are you trying to wind me up?’

‘Er...’

‘I thought so. Go away.’

Sarah’s mother can be a bit uncompromising sometimes, so it seems I’m back to plan A – having my ashes scattered around the base of my favourite sycamore tree. Better go and talk to the tree tomorrow.