Wednesday, November 18, 2009

If tears could.....



Build a stairway and memories a lane, I’d walk right up to heaven and bring you home again.

I don’t remember the first time I seen these words at a cemetery but I do remember thinking that it was nice. But that was before I had seen it waaayyy too many (as in hundreds) of times. It makes me grateful for the few original verses that I happen to find.

They come in all sizes and shapes, from dollar store plastic stones to those made by a loved ones own hands. And, even though I have had enough of them, I always take a picture.










































Monday, October 26, 2009

Just a random thought

I order from a certain plastics company regularly as part of my job. With every order, they include some sort of religious pamphlet to help spread the word of God.

This last pamphlet was a collection of stories by a number of people each telling their own personal story of how God heard and answered their prayers.

I scanned through the pamphlet and came across the story of a woman who was concerned that her husband was not saved. I don’t have permission to write exactly what she said but it concerned her prayer group lifting him up and saying something along the lines of if he was saved, give her peace and if not, knock him down. Well, the next day he had a heart attack! He didn’t die that day but did a couple of months later due to heart problems.

I mentioned the story to my husband who said “it was probably a coincidence.” He missed the point I was trying to make which was: Here is a story of a deeply religious woman who truly believes in the power of prayer. She and her fellow church members believe that God answers prayers. So why in the world would they even mention “knocking him down?” Why dare God to “knock” anyone down? Why not a simple “please let him be saved?”

I don’t know about her, but I think I would feel pretty darn guilty that I may have played a part in his dying.

Wednesday, October 7, 2009

Holy cow !!!

It’s been a long time since I posted. It’s not that I lost interest; I just haven’t had a moment of free time in the last 6 weeks.
My sister went in for what should have been “routine” surgery and it was anything but routine.

A couple of days stay in the hospital has turned into:
a week at the hospital (not the one in town, but the one 60 miles away of course)
then to a nursing home for some rehab (it lasted less than 6 hours)
back to the hospital for a week (staff infection)
the the nursing home for 5 days
back to the hospital ICU for a week (bleeding ulcer from the pain meds)
then the nursing home for 6 days
back to the hospital ICU for a week (TWO bleeding ulcers)
She’s now back in the nursing home, swelled up like a fricking blowfish and itching from some kind of rash. And no one knows why of course.

I knew before, but her experiences have reinforced my conviction that hospitals are not for the sick. If you need a biopsy, have a non-complicated baby delivery, or most outpatient procedures and you will probably do just fine. It’s when you have to get some actual care that they often fail. There is no communication between anyone, many of the nurses were down right mean, and no one seems to care about anything other than gossiping. It’s all about treating the symptoms and getting you out of there. And when I say symptoms, I mean the ones that caused the hospitalization, not the ones that crop up DURING the hospitalization, like for instance, the massive swelling over her entire body. I heard “Oh, is she more swollen than usual”? And “we’re giving her lasix, that should work, just give it time”. And “maybe she’s allergic to something, it will probably go away”. Should? Maybe? Probably? Well it sounds like MAYBE I could do your job without any specialized schooling.

She has just passed a week out of the hospital and we both hope she doesn’t ever have to return. I sure will feel better about it once the swelling is gone though.
So, that’s what I have been doing the last 7 weeks. The only positive point was that I did a lot of stair climbing during my hospital visits!

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Everything and everyone dies

sooner or later, regardless of how much you pray or wish against it. As you age, the deaths become more frequent. I was also going to say harder to deal with but I'm not sure that's true.

My first memory of death happened when I was a toddler and it was not a person; it was a chicken. My parents decided to raise chickens and the day came when it was time to butcher one of them. I'm pretty sure that it happened before I even knew what death meant. All I knew was that the whole family was there to watch as my dad held an ax high over a chickens head, which was flung over a stump (of course), and he couldn't go through with it. My grandmother had to grab the ax from his hand, swearing the whole time, and whack its head off. The next thing I knew, a headless chicken came running across the yard right to me. No matter where I ran or how much I screamed, and boy, did I scream, it would not untangle from my legs. I remember the blood all over me and the terror I felt. I remember some people laughing and others trying to help. I also remember running by the head laying by that stump and seeing it blink. That death was very hard for me to deal with and I am sure that it played a part in me becoming a vegetarian later in life.

Lots of deaths have happened since then and each one has burnt a permanent memory into my brain. Watching my pet cat flipping around after get getting hit by a car. Hearing that an old boyfriend was murdered and left in a drainage ditch. The last look my mother gave me before she fell asleep and never woke up again. The sound of the fading heart monitor and my cousins words of of love to his mother as we each held a hand at her bedside watching her die. He trying to assure her it was ok to let go, even though we didn't believe it.

This month I experienced another death. Not a person thankfully, but my grand old octopus of a mulberry tree. The spring freeze predictor I have written about here in previous posts. A cancer had invaded it a few years ago and slowly, trunk by trunk, it began to die. I woke a few weeks ago to find that its last three branches had dropped withing inches of the ground. I'm sure that my neighbor is singing to the heavens because the birds will no longer be able to eat the delicious berries and leave those horrible and permanent purple stains on her car or cement driveway.

I am not going to tell her that I plan to plant another to take its place as soon as I can. How else will I know when it is safe to plant my flowers each spring?

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

We took a little vacation

down south recently and of course, I made sure we stopped at a few cemeteries. If it had been up to me we probably would have stopped at every one we passed, but unfortunately my husband doesn't share my fascination with cemeteries to the same extent as I do so we had to compromise.

One of the biggest surprises was the cemetery in Asheville, North Carolina that we stopped at, just by chance. As I was walking around this huge cemetery, I came across the graves of Thomas Wolfe and O Henry. I found it interesting that both headstones were relatively small and neither was adorned except for some small stones and other items that visitors left. Does anyone know why people leave stones on graves?


Here is Thomas Wolfes





Just a short distance away is O Henry! It’s a good thing they had a sign pointing it out because I would not have recognized it by his real name. Again, quite an unimpressive stone.



What a coincidence to find the graves of two famous people without even trying!



I found that cemeteries down south have some similarities to those up here in Michigan. For instance, they like plastic flowers.





And they like to over decorate.



The differences? Well, they tend to mound the graves.



They hyphenate when needed



They fence them in to protect them from ????



They use stones that have fallen to create sculptures and build bridges




It was a fun time. I can't wait to get on the road again!

Thursday, June 25, 2009

Leaving trinkets

at grave sites is something that never occurs to me so I find it interesting when I come across graves decorated with numerous knickknacks, usually accompanied by lots of plastic flowers. It’s not that there is anything wrong with these decorations. In fact, sometimes I feel there must be something wrong with me to find them so amusing (sometimes sad) since there are so many of these colorful graves.

Are the decorators simply bringing gifts that they think their loved one would enjoy? Or, are they trying to reveal (to me) as much as they can about their loved one by filling their four by eight space with items that truly meant something to that person in the grave? Maybe it’s a combination of the two. Whatever the intention, there are many times when I have walked away from a grave site having gained a some knowledge about the stranger buried there. And sometimes I walk away craving more.



That's alot of plastic



A little moss would make all the difference



The baskets looked like they cost more than the flowers



A boiler maker, harley riding, fishing and dog loving man


The American bow hunter


Frogs and Christmas



The headless horseman...opps horsewoman



He loved his cocker spaniel

And he loved his weiner dogs



The twins



Tuesday, June 2, 2009

The Mad Rush



is over for planting. I still have a few things to get into the ground at home but the cemeteries are done at least.

Here are a few pictures of interesting things I found in urns while I was visiting the various cemeteries this spring.


Notice that the beer can takes precedence over the flowers. At least the color of the can matches the flowers.






Everything about this is sad.




I was actually a little freaked out when I peaked into this urn. The eyes of those cats were spooky!!! And don't they know that birds and cats don't mix?





This was found in the urn of a small child who had died. He died only a few years ago so I was very surprised at the lack of flowers on this grave. Very sad. Maybe I'll go back and put something on this grave.





Squirrels and rabbits. Very popular for grave decorations. Next to dogs that is.




By the way, if you have taken any weird or interesting grave pictures, feel free to send them to me, I would love to see them. Maybe I'll even post them here!

Monday, May 18, 2009

Whoa!


Sometime between my job, mushroom hunting, and visiting the area greenhouses, the last couple of months flew by. Where in the world did that time go? And why can’t winter go by that fast?

This week will be a busy one for me. Lots of planting and flowers to deliver. It is still pretty cold for the end of May but the Mulberry tree has begun to leaf out so I think it’s safe to plant.

I don’t have any new cemetery pictures but I can share a few from my mushroom hunts this spring.



This is why these darn mushroom are so hard to find. Look how well they blend into their surroundings.





I almost tripped right over this little guy. It’s a baby sandhill crane.




His mom and dad were trying their best to distract me so I quickly snapped a couple of pictures and went on my way.




What an eerie feeling it was to stand in the middle of these flooded pines.




The picture makes him look huge, but this blowsnake is just a young guy, maybe 10 inches long.



Tuesday, March 24, 2009

The time of year I like least

is almost over. If you live in an area where you have clearly defined seasons like I do here in Michigan, it's that short period of time (but sure seems to last forever) that occurs between winter and spring.


I call it the D season. The final lingering snow piles are dirty; the tree, shrubs, and flowers look dead; the spring peepers are still deep in their holes; the mostly sunless days are dreary.


Once I hear the frogs and see my daffodils everything will be OK.


Wednesday, February 25, 2009

I sure did think

that I would be able to spend more time on my blog once winter hit but that certainly didn’t happen did it?

I just keep finding more stuff to fill my days. Lately, it has been cross-country skiing. I told myself that this year I was going to learn how to ski “skating” style. So far, I have not had much success. Maybe I should have tried to get a better handle on the classic style first?

I also flew down to St. Thomas in the American Virgin Islands - my first ever tropical vacation. Quite an interesting little island that is. Especially Coki Beach. It was a beautiful beach filled with an eclectic mix of people and as an added bonus (for me, anyway), it had a tiny private cemetery. I was not allowed to enter the cemetery but I did manage to take a few pictures from outside the fence.