Joanne Weidner had some reservations about scattering her late husband’s ashes into the sea.
She knew that’s what Michael wanted, but how exactly would she do it? Where would she go? And wasn’t that discouraged for Catholics?
But, she thought, “Why have your ashes sitting on a shelf when you can come down here?” she said Thursday, standing on the banks of the Chesapeake Bay in Middle River.
Instead, Weidner decided to have the remains of her husband, who died in May of colon cancer, incorporated into a concrete reef and dropped into the Chesapeake. Michael Weidner could make the water he loved dearly his final resting place, and fish could make the reef a new home.
“It was exactly what he would have wanted,” Weidner, of Philadelphia, said after returning from a memorial service aboard a charter boat where her husband and several other people were memorialized.
The artificial reefs are made out of environmentally friendly cast concrete — in which the ashes are mixed — by Atlanta-based Eternal Reefs Inc. The reef balls, which are flat on the bottom and full of large holes, range in size from 3 to 6 feet wide and can weigh from 350 pounds to 4,000 pounds. They can cost between about $4,000 and $6,500; loved ones can be buried together in one reef.
“People love what we are doing,” said Eternal Reefs founder Don Brawley, who developed the material and concept 10 years ago.
Families can travel to Sarasota, Fla., to help cast the reef, he said, and many appreciate the hands-on experience.
“It kind of brought us closure,” said Chris Weidner, Michael’s 35-year-old son.
Since his diagnosis four years ago, Michael Weidner and his wife of 42 years went on nine cruises, and while living for a time in Rehoboth Beach, Del., they frequented the Bay.
Joanne Weidner said she wasn’t bothered there isn’t a grave on which to lay flowers. She has the coordinates of the reef and plans to visit — and one day be dropped nearby in her own reef.
“What is a more beautiful cemetery than the open ocean?”
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