Poor old Aunty Grace has gone, snuffed it, de-existed. She was 94; she’d have been 95 in July... had she made it – which she didn’t. According to her son, Cousin Brian, she was going downhill – metaphorically; she wasn’t able of physically going anywhere for the past year or so. So it was no great shock to the family when she did eventually, also metaphorically... fall off her perch and kick the bucket.

But there again, according to Cousin Bri, she was given every chance to decide what sort of funeral she would like; which I think was pretty big of her immediate family. He told me the options were the following: First up, the usual funeral Mass, followed by conventional planting in the family grave. For some reason the old girl didn’t fancy that much. Brian reckons it was because it would have meant being buried on top of Uncle David... her late husband – and she’d always been a bit prudish about that sort of thing... ahem.

Then Brian and her other children offered her the option of eternity from the inside of our hopefully soon-to-be-acquired cremmy. But again, the old lady demurred; using the old excuse of: “If I’ve been reduced to a pile of ashes... how will St Peter know it’s me when I show up at the pearly gates, all blackened and powdery?”

OK fine; they then suggested to her that, since in her younger days she often took a dip off the Għar id-Dud chalet, she might fancy a nice burial at sea. Aunty Grace this time cited sea pollution as a reason for her not to comply. Not, you understand, pollution of the sea by Aunty Grace... but pollution of Aunty Grace by “all that filth that gets into the ocean these days”.

Then one her other sons, Geoff, had – what I thought was – a brilliant idea. Why not send what’s left of the poor old dear into space on the next space probe into the cosmos. Success: Aunty thought this a wonderful idea and so she informed the family; it would be both a ‘green’ option and the unique opportunity to get to see places and planets she could otherwise only dream about. Yes, by this time, the Alzheimers was really starting to kick-in.

Not surprisingly, Aunty rather turned her nose up at being reduced to a – albeit a rather superior – grow bag

So it was agreed... Aunty Grace – upon her demise – would be launched into outer space, to cruise the furthest reaches of the universe for eternity; a pristine advertisement for ecologically-friendly funerals. Until... the family looked into the cost of sending the old dear into orbit around the sun. Suffice it to say they would not only have had to mortgage all their properties... several times over, they would also have had to win the Super 5 draw every week for about 10 years. So no, Aunty Grace was not going on a joy ride above the stratosphere.

Aunty was disappointed and equally dismissive of the very latest technology: that of reducing her earthly bits and pieces to a sort of... well, fertiliser sludge, to spend perpetuity boosting crop yields around the island. Not surprisingly, Aunty rather turned her nose up at being reduced to a human grow bag – albeit a rather superior – human grow bag.

What a dilemma: With time running out and the old girl not aiming to be around for much longer, one suggestion was cryogenics. This would entail freezing her remains, with the unlikely prospect of defrosting her later and – presumably – back to life. In the meantime, we could pop her into Cousin Geoff’s freezer, until a decision was reached. (Geoff runs a thriving business as a butcher).

But the possibility that one of his, not too bright, shop assistants might mistake Aunty Grace – a large lady – for a prime porker – an easy mistake to make – would be much too much for Geoff to monitor 24/seven.

So what to do?

The solution came just 48 hours before the poor old dear did eventually pop her clogs. Yes, of course, it had been staring us in the face for a while.

The family would present her well-preserved – well-preserved for a near centenarian, that is – stiff to the handsome young male medical students at Mater Dei Hospital; where she could posthumously help in their search for cures to so far incurable maladies.

So everybody, including Aunty Grace, was happy... or happyish.

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