At the cemetery 2014

Yesterday I went to the local cemetery-Maple Grove-in New Haven with a friend to set out hostas at the grave site of her parents. Her mom died over 4 years ago and she has not been to the cemetery during that time. Not everybody has that ideal relationship with their parents that is advertised on Facebook. They leave us without saying "I'm sorry for the harm I caused you"-bitter and stubborn to the end. Even as adult children those wrongs can still shape our lives. It is difficult to forgive and let go. Maybe this is a step forward for her.
Anyway the plants looked nice, and while we worked, we spent time together talking of her parents and her children and how they deserved their own separate feelings and memories of their grandparents. Some things are better kept hidden.
I took a great photo of her in her work clothes and gloves and flushed face from the exertion of digging.
We drove slowly on down the lane to my mom and dads grave mentioning names of those we knew as we passed other stones. Some are early settlers of New Haven area and many names I know as distant relatives that I recall my parents speaking of. One section has names of Celeryville families; another has a black marble bench at one grave site. Most are decorated with bright silk flowers since Memorial Day is this weekend. At my parents grave, we pull the weeds around the thriving daylilies I recently set out inside the chintzy white plastic fence that prevents the caretakers from mowing them down or spraying with weed killer. I think of how Mother would like the attention to her grave and the memories I recall of her hours in the flowers. And the lilies even came from her farm on Townline 12-the bronze ones.
Memorial Day used to be known as Decoration Day when I was a child. Somewhere along the way -1967- it was officially changed  and then in 1971 it became a Monday holiday. It even used to signal the end of the school year and the beginning of summer vacation. But no longer.
My Decoration Day memory was a trip with my Aunt Lucy and my Grandmother Maudie along the mountain path to the steep hillside graveyard where numerous mystery relatives were buried. New plastic roses replaced those faded from a years exposure. They spoke in hushed tones about the familes buried there and even shed tears for my baby sister and Maudies lost child Oliver.
As we drove around Maple Grove, we  ended in the back corner where a small area segregates the lost babies and children from the main cemetery. How sad. Small graves with small stones or only name markers stuck away alone. Some were well cared for and others not. I went along each and pulled the weeds as Suzie read the names. They are remembered another year.
The day does establish a specific day to remember the dead. At least it reminds the living to care for the remains of their ancestors and to even speak their names once again.