By Adam Bernstein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, May 11, 2008

Josephine Bensack Czapp, 89, who died of kidney failure April 6, grew up on a farm in Manassas and raised many kinds of pets, including horses and goats. In recent years, she became so close to her parakeet, Snookie, that she wanted to spend eternity with him.

Her request was to be buried with Snookie. If the bird went first, she wanted him stored in the freezer until she died. She appreciated the family comeback that if Snookie outlived her, a relative would buy a large freezer in which to keep her.

Snookie died in September after having served as Czapp's winged companion for about 10 years.

Czapp had formed a strong attachment to Snookie, often refusing to do anything without him perched on her finger. They ran errands together and visited her relatives. They exchanged confidences and traded pecks. Czapp did not like to leave her feathered friend alone.

She asked him, "Who's grandma's baby?"

The family joked that they would have her committed if he replied.

Snookie had entered her life in 1993, after the death of her husband, Michael J. Czapp. The couple had been married 56 years. The Czapps grew up near each other in Manassas, and they began dating after meeting at a dance. She spent much of her life as a homemaker; Michael worked as a carpenter.

Although Josephine Czapp had a passion for polka, pets were the love of her life. Her menagerie included horses, goats, dogs and a lizard. She had raised parakeets when she was younger, but Snookie, a handsome male with white, blue and gray feathers, captivated her like no other.

"After her husband died, she was on her own, and we bought her a parakeet cage for Christmas," said Cheryl Czapp, Josephine's daughter-in-law. "She balked at that, but somewhere along the line my sister-in-law took her to the store and they bought a parakeet."

Snookie.

For a time, he competed for Czapp's affections with Pickle, a parakeet that had belonged to a grandson. But Snookie became the enduring favorite.

The family placed a sign in her bedroom that said, "This place is for the birds."

It was "very traumatic" the day he died in September, Cheryl Czapp said.

Josephine Czapp called her son Robert about midday. Alas, he couldn't leave work for several more hours. When he did, Robert Czapp found his mother with the bird still cupped in her hands. He had to pry it away from her.

After Snookie's death, Josephine Czapp was inconsolable. Crippled with arthritis, she prayed nightly that she might die soon, Cheryl Czapp said. She was no longer the spry lady who, into her late 50s, would camp out with her grandsons in the wilderness or in the tree house behind her brick rambler in Manassas.

Cheryl Czapp alerted family and friends to her mother-in-law's death by an e-mail. Shunning a sappy tone, the subject line read: "It's time to defrost Snookie."

Celi Clark, a spokeswoman for the Wisconsin-based National Funeral Directors Association, said she knew of no state or federal regulations about animals being buried with owners.

Such arrangements, Clark said, are usually made at the discretion of the cemetery owner.

She said the issue "doesn't come up a lot," and that trinkets, letters and other non-organic possessions are more commonly buried with people. When someone wants to be interred with an animal, pet remains are usually cremated and placed in an urn inside the coffin, she said.

Josephine Czapp was buried April 12 at Sacred Heart Catholic Church, the church started by her parents with other Slovak farmer immigrants near Manassas.

Snookie, reposing in a tin box, was placed by her side. Cheryl Czapp wrote in an e-mail, "We put his small coffin under her rosaried hands for their mutual final resting place."