i generally love the feature as i like reading about people who influenced our world and aren’t particularly well known
the thing that caught my eye about this one is the comment in the second last sentence Marshall has been the Dean of the Society of American Magicians since 1992 – and will hold that title until his magic wand is broken at his gravesite
what should be done at a unicyclist’s gravesite?
let the air out of the tyre?
weld on a second wheel?
I think tear/rip the end of the hub off or rip the crank off the hub, seeing as this is probably the most final damage that any uni can sustain, and obviously at the grave side a 6ft drop is readily available to do so.
Re: A dead magician and a unicycling ritual question
Dismantle their personal favorite unicycle seat. Every serious unicyclist has customized their favorite unicycle seat to suit their needs. It’s the most personal piece that is on a unicycle. It’s the piece they probably put the most work into.
When they die the seat should be dismantled and the pieces spread out amongst other unicyclists to be incorporated into their unicycle seats.
Re: A dead magician and a unicycling ritual question
All the deceased unicyclist’s friends and family should rejoice in the fact that magicians can be bigger nerds than us!
But, if the deceased is a super-big unicycle nerd, or was also a high-ranking magician, they should be buried riding the unicycle. It doesn’t need to be broken.
As for me, my wishes are well known among my friends and family: Cut out the good parts, if any (hopefully I’m too old to have any left), and burn the rest. Then have a party! Break whatever you want; I’ll be dead so it’ll all be on you.
The wand breaking ritual is interesting. You hear of unicyclists that have been around for a long time and accomplished some things. Then they die and you read about it on these fora. Ben Linder, UniBiker, Floyd Beattie, others. And in this little, private world we honor these individuals in usually small and insignificant ways. But it doesn’t matter because you, each and every one, were under their skin and you know what they felt at one time. The group with that knowledge, which is diverse and reaches far into many aspects of the psyche, is small and the remainder understand little of it. And so we continue to ride with those that fall. The only difference is that we get back up again for now.
On Saturday the 14th of March, Johan Kruger, a side-drummer in the pipe-band I play in, dies in a car accident along with his eldest daughter and her best friend.
A fourth person in the car walked away from the accident without a scratch.
The funeral was last Thursday and the band played at the grave-side.
We were going to place a set of drum sticks on his coffin.
His widow heard about it and insisted on using his actual set of sticks.
On Saturday the 14th of March, Johan Kruger, a side-drummer in the pipe-band I play in, died in a car accident along with his eldest daughter and her best friend.
A fourth person in the car walked away from the accident without a scratch.
The funeral was last Thursday and the band played at the grave-side.
We were going to place a set of drum sticks on his coffin.
His widow heard about it and insisted on using his actual set of sticks.
when archeologists unearth people from old graves they are satisfied to find things that were supposed to accompany the deceased person to the next world.
so burying a unicycle will undoubtly help us to travel far far away … and future archeologists will be delighted to learn about the rites and custom of our little tribe …
They should be dressed in full shin pads, wristguards and helmet, then allowed to drift out to sea on the ebb tide at sunrise, their body laid out on a burning pyre built upon an over-inflated Coker wheel.
Then as the Coker tyre bursts and the wheel sinks, the magnificent disc of the sun will rise like a burning unicycle, first still-standing on the horizon, then gapping the sky.#
For a high status unicylist, a clown could be sacrificed.
Or they could just bury them, with their coffin borne to the graveside under a guard of honour of tyre pumps.
What do we do with the unicyclists that wish to be cremated (such as myself)? CrMo doesn’t burn very well…
Perhaps the ashes could be put into the legs of a frame, and the unicycle could be ridden by a fellow rider at the funeral procession. Dunno what to do with the frame afterwards…
I don’t like waste; just have a guard of honor of unicycles held by the deceased ones riding pals. Or have the pallbearers riding unicycles. That would be cool.
I’m not sure what you, Maestro, should have done at your cremation. Cremation just involves too many weird elements for me. No corpse, no coffin, no pallbearers: it’s missing a lot of “normal” elements found in a funeral. I’ve never been to a cremation service either, so I’m not sure what people do besides eulogize and meet relatives.
My uncle was cremated last month, there is still the corpse, coffin and pallbearers.
I want to either be buried with my unicycle, or leave it to my family as a reminder of me. Probably the latter really. I’d rather they moved on to the next generation of unicyclists to enjoy.
However if Im cremated, I’d have my ashed put in the frame (alu so it doesnt rust) then buried or kept as a reminder.
