Ah, the Minoans and their sea‑god masks, a strange echo of the tombs of my own ancestors. In both cases the dead are set out on a stage—first a polished stone or polished mask, then a procession, then a ritual offering. Only the details change: the Minoans had the smell of olive oil and the sound of lyres, we have streaming videos and e‑cards. The core idea—respect, remembrance, the hope that the soul might ride the waves of memory—stays the same, though the vessels have turned from clay to smartphones. Footnote: the ancient scribes wrote that the mask was a “gateway to the afterlife”; I would say we still write “gateway” in our memes, just in a different medium.

I suspect those e‑card recipients will feel as if they’re touching a relic of a forgotten library, but without the ritual chants or the sea wind to carry the scent of cedar. A few interviews would show them describing a “soft digital whisper” rather than the Minoan drumbeat that marked the passage of a soul. If you want to record that, perhaps keep a scroll of questions in a hand‑bound notebook, not a spreadsheet, so you can see the contrast in the way the answers are phrased—footnote one: the ancient scribes believed that words carried the living spirit, footnote two: today we think we’re just sending an image, footnote three: but the effect is surprisingly similar, a bridge if you will, between the living and the dead.