Near Flat Rock, Michigan, April 14, 2012
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Community
*heart*
Thanks. (Is this somewhere near your neck of the woods? I mean, not exactly, but a lot closer than Cincinnati?)
Well, I’m sorry to say that I have never heard of Flat Rock. I’ll have to look it up! Unless it’s in the UP I’ll bet it’s closer than Cinnci!
What a sad gravesite, with the figurines and the vase knocked over. I’m guessing this is from a recent burial?
Of course, the saddest ones are those that haven’t seen a visitor in years, maybe even a century. Near my grandparents’ graves is a little headstone for a child who died over 50 years ago, when she was just a couple of weeks old. When I first noticed it, as a little girl myself, the grave had little toys and flowers on it. At Christmastime someone left a tiny decorated tree and a creche on the grave. As time went by however, I saw fewer flowers and toys. This year the grave was covered in leaves and the stone was overgrown with grass. I tried to clean it up, but figured it’d been years since this child’s parents had been there. Maybe the parents are gone themselves.
Yes, I think it was just long enough ago for the visits to slow down a bit and the remembrances to start fading. And getting knocked over.
The wee ones are always tough to see, and the one you mention must have seemed especially sad to you as a kid. It’s nice you tidied it up a bit; her parents may indeed have passed on, or at least become frail and/or forgetful.
The one that really tore me up during our visit (a different grave) was when I cleared the leaves off a stone and found two names, father and adult son—son died in 2002, father in 2003. Just about lost it completely.
I like cemeteries in the US. Most Indians (Hindus and Muslims) don’t go back to visit the graves of their dead once they are gone. I like that idea of being able to go back and visit, to tend to the grave in some way, to remember in more physical manner. It seems like a good way to grieve.
Yes. I like the sense of solemnity, and of being surrounded by hidden stories. Even a small cemetery gives you a sense of the enormous complexity of human relationships.
The same day I took this photo, I saw a somewhat unusual name, strikingly similar to someone I originally know from Vox. I wondered if they might be related, even though the ex-Voxer lives in Cincinnati, not Michigan. Even more curiously, the stone in question belongs to a relative of Amy’s! It’d be truly bizarre if Amy and said Voxer were linked through the person on the stone—I need to ask.
(Of course, I’m still gobsmacked that, if I’ve got my facts straight, you happened to move into a town containing one of my relatives; our name ain’t too common in this country!
)