We are a group of friends of Rob Siciliano's, seeking to raise money to a proper grave marker for him in his final resting place.

He's buried in a numbered, unmarked plot at the Beechwood Cemetary, just north of Toronto, which was funded by Social Services. According to policy, they pay for burial, but not for a tombstone or any type of personalized grave marker. Rob's grave site is stark and impersonal.

It is our intention to raise money to comission a proper marker for Rob. We've made some inquiries into this and it would take between $1,000 and $3,000.

There are various possible choices we could make for this, but for starters the cemetary won't allow a stand-up gravestone. It would need to be a flat stone, probably raised at a 40-45 degree slant.

We have the choice of having an engraved stone marker, or having it mounted with a brass plaque, which would be decorated by text and maybe a flat image; or by a raised bronze relief. Some people also have photographs mounted on gravestones. We could do any or all of these things. Someone also suggested punking up the stone in some way, using found materials like maybe a bicycle chain to give people a better idea of who Rob was and his attitude.

So far what we've discussed is dividing the decoration between an image of Rob (sculpted?) and some of his poetry, and also probably including some element of found stuff -- if it can be permanently mounted. Go to Rob's site for a sketch of the possible look.

It's still early into the game for this project, so we're open to suggestions and discussion about this. Even if we go with the above concept, we need to decide on an image of Rob and what words of his to use. We don't want to put off deciding for long, however. We want to be ready once we've raised the money. He was buried last December (2004), after all; the one-year anniversary of his death won't be long in coming.

We have opened a bank account, which has 3 signers to keep us all honest, and we'll be setting up a PayPal account so donations can be received online. Please contact aldo12xu@tobescene.com if you're interested in dontating money and/or time to benefit activities. You can also click on the link below to join an email list which will advise you of new developments and benefit activities.

To join send an email to Rob_List-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
You can view messages and updates by clicking Rob's newsgroup

We want to keep things moving with this effort, but there is still plenty of room for involvement, and we would be grateful for any input or suppport.

ROB'S FRIENDS

Photos by Sandra Alland

To make a monetary contribution you can mail us a cheque or money order (in Canadian dollars):

Make cheque or money order payable to: Rob Siciliano Enterprises

Direct deposits can be made at any TD Canada Trust branch. Just provide the following information

Written receipts will be available but, unfortunately, we are not set up as a charity organization, so contributions will not be tax deductible.

TOTAL RAISED as of December 3, 2005: $495