A story about "green burials" made me think of my father.

In a green burial, the deceased is not embalmed. He is natural and fresh. He is buried in a bio-degradable coffin. Maybe a tree is planted over him. Maybe not.

There's a whole new market for this, things like --

• coffins made of recycled newspaper.
• fair-trade bamboo.
• cotton shrouds.

And this all reminds me of my father. He died a couple years ago and attended a traditional Jewish burial.

He was unembalmed and wore a simple cotton robe and a plain wood coffin with no metal hardware to leave behind when his molecules return to the Earth.

Hey, whadaya' know, the Chosen People were Green before Green was cool.

I'm still thinking about a tree.