In Repose Blog

Glow in the Dark

The following article was written by Elena Moonn for In Repose

“I swear, it was a glow-in-the-dark cross!” Some things simply have to be seen to be believed.  A friend of mine told me about a cemetery they pass on the way to and from work.  Someone had put a glow-in-the-dark cross on a grave.  People can be very creative when it comes to memorializing a loved one that has passed over; skateboards on a teenager's headstone, crystals left on a monument, even a glass case with a treasured doll attached to a grave stone, among other things.  This was the first time I had heard of a glow-in-the-dark cross.

My mind created an image the moment I heard about the cross.  Several designs emerged from my slightly twisted imagination.  The favorite was an eerie ectoplasm green wood grain version.  It seemed to satisfy the need for it to be a little creepy.  It was after all in a graveyard... at night.

The cemetery was in an area that I only occasionally passed through and rarely at night and it would have to be a night time visit.  Being there after sunset was not an issue, I actually like graveyards at night.  They are quite peaceful and calming, if you allow them to be.  It was more a matter of traveling.  Living in a rural area does have its limitations.  The cemetery was on one of the roads into the larger city in the area and was not the road I would normally use.  At least the cemetery was in an accessible place; no long roads or pad-locked gates.  Then opportunity presented its self.  Being in the right part of town at the right time of day.  Now my problem was remembering where on the road the cemetery was located.  I tend to drive a bit on the high side of the speed limit and the search would require me driving on the low side, which was a challenge.  The graveyard was found on a curve with a driveway that would allow me to safely pull off the road.

Finally, I see not one, but two crosses.  They were about half way through the cemetery and half way between the drive where I was parked and a second drive at the other end.  There was no way I was walking through there at night with heels on; forget seeing critters running from my car lights.  I tried taking a picture from my car, but the crosses were too far away.  Reviewing the shots revealed nothing but a chain link fence with a dark background.

But I was not to be deterred.  As luck would have it I had the opportunity to return the next night with my son.  The second visit I parked just off the road, doing my best to stop where I would have a good shot of the crosses.  My son tried to take the the picture, but even with the zoom lens they were still too far away.  I really wanted the photograph, so with no thought about walking into a graveyard at night, I grabbed the camera, set the car flashers and headed for the fence.  As I got closer it looked like three crosses, but it was a reflection in a polished granite monument.  Finding the best angle, resting my arms on the top of the fence I got the first picture.  That was when I heard it... the rustling of the leaves at the base of the fence.  A rabbit would have run at my approach, it was still a bit too cool for snakes to be moving around much and there was not enough of a breeze to make that much noise.

The only thing to fear is fear its self... and maybe zombies, but I was seriously thinking there is a reason for giving into the fight or flight reflex.  I wanted a second picture and though it was tempting to run I kept telling myself not to look down.  If I couldn't see it, it could only be rustling leaves.  Did I mention I didn't hear leaves rustling anywhere else?  With the second photo taken, I headed back to the car... quickly.  After all, rustling leaves could slip through the chain links.

At home I look at the photos on my computer.  As it turned out there were not glow-in-the-dark crosses.  They were solar powered; gone was my ectoplasm green. They were a glowing white that did not give off light, only holding the shape of a cross and illuminating the white frame.

That gave me something to think about.  Solar powered... energy from the sun... the source of life on this Earth.  The sun lighting the darkness, but the cross only lighting the form, not anything around it... a pale imitation of the original... form with little substance.  I almost wish it had been ectoplasm green.  It wouldn't have given me as much to think about.  .....

The Paper Flower Funeral Club

Special article by Contributor Jamie Sue Austin

I’m part of  a group called the Paper Flower Funeral Club.  Often many beautiful, small, cemeteries are left neglected during secular remembrance holidays. With the residents families dead and gone there is no one left to honor their memories. Our group is dedicated to the revitalization of old, forgotten cemeteries through the placement of handmade paper flowers. 

(Here is one of our members making a purple rose  J We try to use bright colors so they can be seen from the roadside.)

This year I will be heading the placement ceremony at a small local cemetery.  The placement will be on October 30^th. October 30^th is often known as Mischief Night or Devil’s Night in the United States.  It is not uncommon for acts of trespassing and vandalism to occur on this night.  In part an October 30^th placement protests the negative acts conducted on that date, however the main reasoning behind selecting the date is because its proximity to the pagan holiday of Samhain which celebrates the yearly harvest and pays honor to the dead.  It is believed that the veil between the living life and the afterlife becomes thinner as Samhain approaches allowing those that have passed before to hear the petitions of their supplanters.

Heading the placement is a matter I take very seriously. What I say as we place flowers on the graves represents our intentions to honor those who came before us for their contributions to our lives.   In the same way that someone who presides over a funeral must feel a twinge of guilt for not knowing the correct thing to say I too am facing a considerable amount of frustration in selecting the right words.  How do I sum up the lifelong contributions of strangers who, most likely, are from various religious, cultural, and socio-economic backgrounds?  My audience is 100 years dried into dust beneath the clay, forgotten, and un-revered.  How do I emphasis our connection to them? 

You see, nothing exists in a vacuum.  The decisions made by the bones below when they were with flesh are as real and with consequence as the decisions we make today.  They built the roads we drive on, formed the companies we work for, settled the towns we live in,  and created the law and common practices we abide by.  The local culture we experience now is  result of their constant tinkering.   The lessons we have learned from our collective past were hard taught at their expense.   The water leeched from the remains beneath our feet generations before our birth is the same water in our cup today.  And while we wish we were much removed from then, untouchable by the cold and quiet grave, we are but one breath from becoming the same as and a part of them.  What words best connect the beating butterfly wings of the past to the winds of today?

It’s hard to convey the sense of unity that we all should feel.  If the footprints we leave behind in our daily walks were not washed away by rain or wind or sun… if they were collected, catalogued, and kept for prosperity… if our fleeting thoughts were bottled and shelved, we could see our effect on the world.  We could watch the piles of footprints grow, build warehouses for our  bottled dreams, and know the intimate details of the lives before ours.  We would see the path carved for us by the actions of our ancestors.  We could better understand how to carve a path for our decedents.

But, we are fickle temporal creatures.  Eternity stretches out around us in all directions and we see only a glimmer of a fraction, a mere glimpse of the now.  The past is a far away thing, a distant fairy tale, a story we tell our children.  The future is a wistful dream, a wisp of white smoke rising in the distance; intangible and ethereal.  The bits in between are ancillary characters to our personal dramas.  How can I explain a concept that I barely grasp myself?

Jamie Sue, I think you already, and most eloquently, have.--Candace

Headstones

Today Nancy Brown of SpiritRemains.com kicks off (oh yes, pun intended) our newest project at In Repose.

I'm still pondering over what exactly to name this project and am looking for suggestions, so don't be shy.

The concept is simple: Interesting headstones! They can be very old, funny, mysterious or elaborate. They can be of famous people or pets or even roadside memorials. Anything goes as long as they are interesting! Here is the headstone Nancy sent me today:

The meter itself has a "64" year time limit on the dial and has the EXPIRED flag raised.

This woman who had a great sense of humor and always used to say that when she died she wanted a parking meter on her grave that says "Expired". So her nephew got her one on ebay! This grave is right by the road so everyone can see it and many people have stopped to get a chuckle.