Would you have done the same thing or am I just a sentimental sap?
Yesterday morning we went to the cemetery to plant flowers on the grave sites of my husband's great grandparents and grandparents just like we do every Memorial Day with my mother-in-law. We always bring a variety of red, white and blue flowers as great grandfather is a WWI vet.
The graves are under one of the many huge shady Oak trees that are prominent throughout the cemetery. I was busy planting red impatiens in the urn behind great grandfather's headstone when I happened to look up and saw a small lone grave marker in the blazing sun where the shade from the trees never hits.
The grass was burned around it, all yellow and dry and picky, it was a stark difference from the rest of the tombstones surrounded by plush, soft emerald green grass. I was drawn to it and proceeded to walk over to it to investigate, like the sun shining on it was beckoning me over.
When I got there, I saw that the headstone was not marble like all the others, but a slab of drab gray slate. The once arched slab of slate now only arched half way with a sharp angular slant down to the left to about the center of its height indicating it had at one point been broken off.
There were no ornate inscriptions carved into it, no markings whatsoever, actually, on either side. No name. No dates. Nothing to identify the person who had been deserted and forgotten so long ago. As a matter of fact, the only thing on it was bird poop, which to me was like adding insult to injury.
I don't know why, but it pulled at my heart strings causing my eyes to well up with tears. So I went back to our site, got the spade and six red impatiens and brought them over to the sad, lonely little tombstone and began to break up the fallow ground and then planted them in a line in front of that forgotten and faded slate marker.
I just couldn't bear the thought of it being deserted, unloved and uncared for, alone and long forgotten.
So, would you have done the same thing or am I just a sentimental sap?
Terra
The graves are under one of the many huge shady Oak trees that are prominent throughout the cemetery. I was busy planting red impatiens in the urn behind great grandfather's headstone when I happened to look up and saw a small lone grave marker in the blazing sun where the shade from the trees never hits.
The grass was burned around it, all yellow and dry and picky, it was a stark difference from the rest of the tombstones surrounded by plush, soft emerald green grass. I was drawn to it and proceeded to walk over to it to investigate, like the sun shining on it was beckoning me over.
When I got there, I saw that the headstone was not marble like all the others, but a slab of drab gray slate. The once arched slab of slate now only arched half way with a sharp angular slant down to the left to about the center of its height indicating it had at one point been broken off.
There were no ornate inscriptions carved into it, no markings whatsoever, actually, on either side. No name. No dates. Nothing to identify the person who had been deserted and forgotten so long ago. As a matter of fact, the only thing on it was bird poop, which to me was like adding insult to injury.
I don't know why, but it pulled at my heart strings causing my eyes to well up with tears. So I went back to our site, got the spade and six red impatiens and brought them over to the sad, lonely little tombstone and began to break up the fallow ground and then planted them in a line in front of that forgotten and faded slate marker.
I just couldn't bear the thought of it being deserted, unloved and uncared for, alone and long forgotten.
So, would you have done the same thing or am I just a sentimental sap?
Terra
― George Carlin
Just when you think you've got it all figured out, someone changes the rules.
Fast & Easy Content Creation
***Especially if you don't have enough time, money, or just plain HATE writing***
Sal
When the Roads and Paths end, learn to guide yourself through the wilderness
Beyond the Path
Just when you think you've got it all figured out, someone changes the rules.