Death in the Mist

A small family cemetery lies on a raised jut of land very near out house. It's a quiet, lonely spot in a stand of pines.

I stopped there this morning on my walk.

I find it strange that graves could be dug so close to the creek, but the land does rise here.

Our county is filled with water -- rivers, creeks, serpentine patches of mud -- so people bury their dead on any piece of higher ground, no matter how small. The county is dotted with tiny graveyards of five or ten stones.

This one's rather old.

"Midgett" is a local name. Now it's spelled "Midyette"; I don't know why. Apparently the pronunciation has always been "Midget," with the emphasis on the first syllable.

Not much difference in their years, but the surname spelling is clearly going through some flux. Either that or the stone-cutter made a big no-no.

Mr. Shipp, an appropriate name around here.

We work so hard to keep the physical memories of our dead ones erect, noble, as if they'd just died. But truly, the dead are like their stones -- their memories wear away and they long to lean into earth.

An interesting shape for a gravestone:

The sun shines on the stones' faces. Someday Jesus will come back through the sky, bright like that sun, and these dead will thrust aside the dirt and climb from their plots, turn their backs on those death dates and walk into a new life.

It seems odd, but right out on that same creek the fog settled thick above the water as I stood among the graves. School was delayed two hours locally due to fog.

The fog didn't reach the cemetery, but someday I'll get a few photos of those graves wrapped in mist. That'll be something to see.