Article By Shawne K. Wickham • Union Leader Sunday News Staff
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EVEN IN ALL HER GRIEF, Melissa LeBeau knew just what to do when her mother died unexpectedly last month.
Last weekend, on a postcard-perfect autumn day, LeBeau buried her mother’s ashes beneath a newly planted rose of Sharon bush at Life Forest cemetery in Hillsborough. She and her family and friends shared stories about her mom and placed red longstemmed carnations at the burial site. Life Forest is a “conservation cemetery,” where someone can have their cremated remains buried beneath a tree of their choice. It’s the first such place in New Hampshire and may well be unique in the entire country. It’s where LeBeau’s mother had insisted she be laid to rest, after close family friends were buried there two years ago. The ceremony was completely different from any funeral she had ever attended, said LeBeau, who lives in Londonderry. “People were dressed to be outside and people were there to celebrate the life of somebody they loved,” she said. “It wasn’t the typical everyone’s in black, everyone’s head’s down, everyone’s crying, everyone’s miserable…. None of that happened.” “It’s down to earth, literally,” she said. For Life Forest co-founders Mel Bennett and John O’Neil, their work is personal, even sacred.
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Reference
Danielle Stevens
603-315-0790
inquiries@thelifeforest.com
http://www.thelifeforest.com
Original source can be found here.
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