I Want to Know Where I Will Be Buried

Weekend Reads v. 15.11.2025

Credit: iStock

It’s been nearly a month since I read this essay by Jessi Bridges that examines what burial practices say about a culture, and I can’t stop thinking about it. Not the specific points she raised, though they are sharp and insightful, but more the question of looking ahead and wondering if I’m building a life worth remembering.

Stay with me. I promise this isn’t some dark and desperate rambling! No, quite the contrary. I read this essay about a topic I rarely think about, and somehow it’s kindling a small fire of purpose in me.

One of the minor points raised in the essay is essentially, you can tell a lot by a culture by how they treat their dead. There was a time, not so long ago, that when presented with the question, “What will happen to your body after you die,” people would have said, “Well, what a strange question. You very well know I will be buried in the church graveyard.” And they could list the likely attendees of the ceremony that would mark their death.

Bridges points out, “It was once common practice for Christians to bury their dead at church. But this practice too has gone by the wayside. It’s no coincidence that the disappearance of church cemeteries coincides with an uptick in cremation and death disappearing from public view altogether.

“There can be little doubt that in the Western world we don’t like death. We hide it away. We don’t talk about it. We don’t plan for it. We medicalize it. Rather than caring for our own dying elderly, we place them in facilities where they die separated from the comfort of their own home and family.”

It’s not so much the matter of how my body will be treated when it comes time for me to pass on, but instead I wonder about what kind of life I will have built by then. Or, to be more pointed, will I be satisfied with the life I will one day exit?

Earlier this week, I took a day trip to New York City. I flew to the city in the morning and took a train home in the evening, and on both legs of the trip I was surrounded by people rushing to get somewhere else. Everyone was so busy and preoccupied with seemingly urgent matters to tend to. As people made calls all around me, I couldn’t help but wonder if the sales deal I overheard would matter in the slightest to that person in 10 years. Would the woman who spent most of our very delayed train ride on the phone be glad she devoted decades to a job that “makes you lose your mind a little?”

No. No I dare say she will not be glad she missed time with her family or time investing in herself to instead sit on a train for hours on end downing popcorn and beer as dinner and setting colleagues up for success for the next day’s meeting.

Nor will I.

I suppose part of the reason Ms. Bridges’ essay stuck with me is the fact that I recognize I have not built a lasting community around me. Years of life in cities and on the move have given me an impressive array of addresses on my Christmas card list, and yet I couldn’t tell you what’s happening in the lives of my neighbors. Heck, I can’t even tell you all the names of my neighbors. Everyone seems to retreat into their homes each evening, counting social media connections as community.

As my friend Kathy wisely observed, it’s a gift to end well. It takes determination and care to end well. Whether that ending is tethered to a project or a job or a season of life, ending well is a noble thing. But one cannot end well if they are spinning around deadlines and busyness and lacking intention.

I feel a sea change coming on in my life. While I’ve been so fortunate to do so many incredible things and to live in so many magical places, I fear I have been building a life that is not pointed toward a satisfying ending. I’ve not developed the discipline required to savor moments and instead find myself chasing the cheap dopamine rush that comes from rushing about.

When it comes to how I spend most of my time – it’s still spent working. That’s OK, but I’d like to take a bit more control over that massive amount of time in my life. There is so much I’ve built professionally for others along the way. I’d like to shift gears and spend this latter half of my career building things for me. I’d like my investments to be primarily focused on people instead of companies or projects.

I’d like to spend more time offline, IRL, than scattered over multiple screens, managing alerts and updates. I’d like to know my neighbors’ names and their stories. I’d like to invest in friends that gather around my table in lieu of amassing usernames referred to as friends. I want to be plugged into a community – a real, physical place – that would notice my absence. To ask the shopkeeper about their family, to enjoy small talk with the postal carrier, to cheer for the neighbor’s son at the homecoming game. In short, I want to know where I will be buried one day.

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“McCardell invented ballet flats and mix-and-match separates, and she introduced wrap dresses, hoodies, leggings, denim, and more into womenswear. She tossed out corsets in favor of a comfortably elegant look and insisted on pockets, even as male designers didn’t see a need for them. She made zippers easy to reach because a woman ‘may live alone and like it,’ McCardell once wrote, ‘but you may regret it if you wrench your arm trying to zip a back zipper into place.’” (Source)

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If you’re hosting a holiday party, you may want to include an audio guest book from After the Tone. Recording messages on these brightly colored vintage phones is a fun surprise for guests, and the voicemails they leave are a wonderful memento of the party. They are offering 25% off now with the code FOREVER25.

Here are a whole lotta recipes for holiday cookies courtesy of Carmen Johnston Gardens.

Maisonette is offering 15% of their whimsical toys! Use the code TOPTOYS. I may have just used this code to finish buying gifts for the littles on my list :)

I hope you can take a bit of time for yourself this weekend!

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