“And now,” without missing a beat, Wendy jumps in, “you also have the option of being a tree in death as well. We’d like to introduce you to the Crann Na Beatha Burial Pod.”

She directs our attention to the thing in the room we’ve all been pretending not to see. The big old egg. The big old sales pitch.

The whole setup was brilliant. The cute, colloquial name of the night. Getting us here to think and speak freely about death. Feeding us gross cookies that might kill us. Then presenting us with a novel option for burial! My little marketing-stunt-loving heart bubbles with delight. As Wendy tells us all about it, Gyaltso busies himself by spreading for-sale copies of his book, Living and Dying: You’re Doing it Wrong, at the feet of the dehumidifier Buddha.

Crann Na Beatha is Gaelic for “Tree of Life.” Wendy wanted to call it Ubh an Bháis, meaning “Egg of Death,” but Gyaltso put the kibosh on that one. The two of them ended up buying this demo model from a guy in Europe after Wendy’s father died, and the local funeral homes went out of their way to harass Wendy about the post-death and burial plans. He wanted to forgo the chemical embalming, be waked at home, and buried on his land in a simple shroud. When Ciad Mille Failte Funeral Services Inc. caught wind of that, they came to Wendy armed to the teeth with threats and lies. You can’t do that. We’re the only ones authorized. That’s immoral, and that’s illegal. Give us your money or there’ll be hell to pay.

But Wendy’s no fool. She’d been studying with Gyaltso and the rest of the backwoods Buddhists Down North, and training to become a death doula. She knew the loopholes and laws, she knew her rights, and she knew how to say “Go fuck yourself” in Gaelic. Her father was waked in his own bed, with ice packs to keep him cool and rice bags to close his eyes, and friends and family by his side until they were ready to say goodbye. Then, they put him in a shroud and buried him in a clearing on the land he loved. Wendy and Gyaltso spent many a morning sitting at the site meditating, until one day, it dawned on them that other people would be ripped off and ripped up by the likes of Ciad Mille Failte Funeral Services Inc., unless somebody had the guts to offer something different. Thus, the Tree of Life Egg of Death plan was hatched.

“It’s a nifty little thing, the Crann Na Beatha eco-burial pod,” Wendy explains. “You curl a naked corpse up into it and you bury it deep in the ground, with no need for toxic chemicals or outrageous expenses. And in the top compartment of the egg, you place a tree. That tree is then nourished by both the biodegradable egg and the body it holds, as both return to oneness with the Earth. And instead of having a swath of land filled with embalmed bodies and crumbling gravestones, you have a sacred forest. Living memorials that take in the pollution of the world and turn it into fresh, clean air. Or fruit, even. That is our vision. A cemetery that is truly green, living, and dynamic as we wish our loved ones and our legacies to be.”