Life Obsessed. Cemeteries, Graveyards And Ossuaries With Loren Rhoads

“All that lives must die, passing through nature to eternity.” William Shakespeare, Hamlet If you enjoy walking in cemeteries, exploring graveyards, and discovering the artistic bone structures of ossuaries, then you’ll love this interview with Loren Rhoads. We discuss our mutual love of these places where nature often reigns in peace and beauty, and share our favorite places in Europe and North America. Loren Rhoads is the author of 199 Cemeteries to See Before You Die, and Wish You Were Here: Adventures in Cemetery Travel, as well as paranormal romance novels, short stories, and essays. Show notes * Memento mori. We are life-obsessed, not death-obsessed! * Why we both love cemeteries and graveyards and some of our favorite places to visit * Graves that change the landscape * The difference in burial rituals and death culture between Europe and North America * Is there something more than just physical remains in a graveyard? * Recommended books on cemeteries and graveyards You can find Loren Rhoads at cemeterytravel.com and LorenRhoads.com Transcript of the interview Jo: Loren Rhoads is the author of 199 Cemeteries to See Before You Die, and Wish You Were Here: Adventures in Cemetery Travel, as well as paranormal romance novels, short stories and essays. Welcome, Loren. Loren: Thank you so much for having me. Jo: I’m so excited to talk to you. I love your work and your blog is so fascinating and you share so much. First up, tell us a bit more about you and how you became so interested in cemeteries. Loren: It was kind of by accident. I grew up in a little farming town in Michigan. And down the road from the farm was this cemetery where my family was buried. So, one year when my mom couldn’t figure out how to entertain us over the summer, she took us down there and taught us how to do gravestone rubbings. It was the first time I’d seen my grandfather’s grave. And I have a cousin that was born about the same time as me but died as an infant. I’d never really thought about death before that. I knew my grandfather was gone, but I hadn’t thought about gone where really. So, that was my first introduction to cemeteries. Years later, when my husband and I were going to Europe for the first time, a friend said, ‘You have to go to Père Lachaise.’ And I thought, ‘Jeez, how weird is that we’re going to make a trip to a cemetery.’ But we were there in January, so we pretty much had the place to ourselves. And I was just stunned by the little family tombs and all the amazing sculpture, and famous people buried there. At that point, somebody’s gone through the graveyard and chalked ‘Jim’ and an arrow all over the cemetery on all the tombs and if you followed the arrows they led you to Jim Morrison’s grave. That was my first introduction to the cult of celebrity, I guess that people actually travel to cemeteries to see famous people. But it wasn’t the famous people that struck me, it was the beauty of the place when I got there. Jo: I agree. And I love Père Lachaise, is gorgeous, it’s in Paris if people don’t know. And, as you say, there are lots of famous people, but all my pictures are of the sort of crumbling tombs, and none of them are the famous stuff. Loren: Well, I came home with a phone full of photographs and there won’t be a single picture of me or my husband...