Sunday, May 30, 2004
Memorial Day
It's a fascinating day for the post-mortal people who have ever lived. Memorial Day is one of the few days of the year when people actually go to the burial sites of the deceased.If you go to the cemetery, there's a buzz in the air. If you listen carefully, you can here the voices of the dead almost whispering in the wind.Some of them are bragging. They have had many visitors, and they will have many more. Some of them are satisfied, they were just remembered.And some of them are sad. They have been long since forgotten. Their relatives are all dead, there names have died out throughout the echos of time, and a rotting chhuck of granite, concrete and metal is all they have left in the world.And even that's starting to decay.As the Memorial Day weekend goes on, and the dead get more and more chatty, please, don't forget the dead whom time forgot.You can spot these lonely graves very easily on Memorial Day. Just look at the rows of graves. Down the line, it's grave after grave with gifts of flowers and signs that say "Mom" or "Dad" or what have you. Then amongst these flowered graves will be one or two that is completly baren. Not a single rose of dafadil. You can feel is when you walk by, noboy has paid attention to or even read one of these gravestones in years, and nobody ever will again.This where we'll all end up eventually. Rotten, underground, forgotten. The inevitabilities of our lives are depressing when you think about it, but we press on anyways. Why do we do it? There has to be a reason. Maybe this is proof in the exsitacne of God. The fact that we struggle and scrape and survive in the face of inevitable and certain death.Though there are many different cemeteries in our fair city of Omaha, there is one that really depresses me.Out in La Vista theres a cemtery. It's small, and old. It has no name, and it's caught in the shadow of Rottella's bread factory, which is it's next door neighbor.Just walking around this graveyard will break your heart. The newest grave is from two years ago. The yard is unmowed and patches of weeds sprout up everywhere. The tombstones are all covered in moss. The moss has liong since crept up and choked oput the names etched upon the stones making it hard, nay impossible, to make out the name on the stone. Even more depressing is the broke down grave. In four or five pieces on the ground, nicely piled up nicely by some unknown care taker or good samaritan. These are also unreadable and moss covered. They lay there being eroded more and more with each windstorm, hailstorm, snow, rain and sunny day. These simple concrete monuments will someday be the only proof that we ever lived at all. I'll be going to this small graveyard, and I'm gonna try and leave a little something on all the forgotten graves. Those forgotten souls should get some recognition.I would appreciate anybody who reads this to at least consider this proposal:If you have a deceased relative and you're going to visit his or her grave on Monday, look around and notice all the lonely graves- that sit there, almost anxiously, for a visitor to come see there. Hopeing against hope that someone, anyone, will come and visit them- please leave something on one of the many forgotten graves. The deceased will appreciate it and Karma will repay you...guarenteed.The cemetery is such an interesting place, when you think about it. All these people who had lives, just like you and me, but there story has come to an end. It sometimes makes me sad to think nobody will ever know anything about these long lost lives. We know the name, if we're lucky, and the birth/death date. Maybe we can assume a few more things, maybe we can see a few more inscribed on the stone, but we win't know particulars.How often they picked their, nose, how often they scratched their ass, what time they liked to be awake, or why they woke up everyday.These things are long since forgotten, particulars of a person that are lost in the ever-shifting sands of time.As visting day for the dead grows more and more to a cresendo that ends on Moday, the whispers of the dead that are carried on the wind will be happy and excited as well as depressed and sluggish. What it all boils down to is the forgotten dead and the forgetten living have a lot in common.Uncared for and left to be forgotten. It makes me think of how thin the line is between life and death. Right now, we're the living visiting the dead, but at anytime, by any means, we could become the dead being visited by the living.It's a sick sad, Ironic world out there, and I wouldn't have it any other way.
posted by Dan # 8:07 AM 0 comments