"I love you, a bushel and a peck. A bushel and a peck and a hug around the neck." (If you want to hear the music and words, by Frank Loesser from the 1950s musical Guys and Dolls, try http://www.niehs.nih.gov/kids/lyrics/bushelpeck.htm.http://www.niehs.nih.gov/kids/lyrics/bushelpeck.htm..) Those words are on the back of a headstone, where you don’t expect any text, on one gravestone in the sunny, walled-in rectangle next to St. Helena’s Episcopal Church. It is nice to laugh in a graveyard, or to think about a song you haven’t heard since childhood. There is some joy in this sunny graveyard, and no fear of death, that I can tell. For some reason, there are no oppressive moss-encrusted live-oaks–there are a few, but they aren’t overbearing–or weeping willows, sentimentally reminding us of fears or superstitions. Of course there is reverence and respect for the dear departed ancestors, and the church makes sure that the grass is mowed at least every other week, and the leaves blown, and the concrete walks edged, and mulch laid down around the shrubs and flower beds. The graves are not sunken, the stones are upright, and the graveyard is respectful.
James Edwin McTeer, "the High Sheriff of the Low Country," is buried there, having left behind all his tales of facing the Land’s End Light or having sometimes defeated the sometimes questionable forces of Dr. Buzzard through equal white magic, in court. "Dirt from a graveyard taken at midnight" is one of the ingredients a Root Doctor might put into a token or charm that casts a spell benefitting a client, according to Sheriff McTeer (High Sheriff of the Low Country [1970], p. 22). I didn’t notice that the dirt around the good sheriff’s grave had been disturbed, thank goodness.
A Mr. Pinckney is described as "a great raconteur," and a Mr. Bradbury simply as "a Virginia gentleman" on their respective gravestones. One local gentleman of means was "a hunter and a salt water fisherman, a respected employer, a loyal friend, a loving husband, a generous father, and an affectionate grandfather." Another "listened well and counseled wisely, with warmth, humor, and love." The memorializers chose their words carefully.
Children who died young are represented by small headstones, sometimes surrounded by several Tonka Toy trucks and cars, as if the child were still playing at the beach, and some of the adult graves are decorated not with the usual chrysanthemums or artificial roses but with seashells. Recent graves may be planted with euonymous or another pretty ground-cover. I saw a camelia laid on the grave of a beloved grandfather. Some families seem to have planted a special tree like a cypress at the bequest of the deceased or of his or her relatives. There are no weeping willows in the St. Helena annex cemetary. Some sets of graves are in regimented rows, some apart from all the others, like row houses in Charleston or like a suburb near a city. Some graves distinguish themselves or their occupants by the marble slab’s being raised over a brick base, and some proclaim their importance with a headstone that sprawls over twenty or thirty feet, with arms to embrace a large or self-important family. Some of the gravestones are quiet or understated, on purpose. The body language of some gravestones says "New" or "Pure," and some says "Prematurely Aged," or "Distressed," or "Antiqued." Since this is not an ancient cemetery like the one around St. Helena’s Church, the stones start with birth dates in the 1870s, though some are from recognizably older Beaufort families, like the DeTrevilles, who have been here since the eighteenth century. Other families that appear often in Larry Rowland’s magisterial history of Beaufort County include the Pinckneys, the VonHartens, the Rhetts, the Verdiers, and the Trasks. Tombstones all seem to be of marble or granite, but I guess that has always been true. I was told that marble holds up better than granite in Beaufort humidity, but I had better not say that without authority.
My favorite memorial is so well-written it makes you wish for the return of the dead, and it happens to have been written by a gentleman I know, about the wife of a friend of mine:
"Bright, intelligent, and wonderfully educated, talented in music and literature, she was a lady of exquisite taste, grace, elegance, and fervor for life. A faithful and loving wife, a caring a nurturing mother, a loyal and devoted friend, she brought joy into the lives of everyone she knew.
Graceful, poised, and determined, she pursued life with candor, frankness, and a keen, enduring sense of good humor. She lived in happiness and died peacefully." Without a memorial cliché in them, those words are one of the most beautiful, thoughtful commentaries on a the life of a good human being I have ever read.
James Edwin McTeer, "the High Sheriff of the Low Country," is buried there, having left behind all his tales of facing the Land’s End Light or having sometimes defeated the sometimes questionable forces of Dr. Buzzard through equal white magic, in court. "Dirt from a graveyard taken at midnight" is one of the ingredients a Root Doctor might put into a token or charm that casts a spell benefitting a client, according to Sheriff McTeer (High Sheriff of the Low Country [1970], p. 22). I didn’t notice that the dirt around the good sheriff’s grave had been disturbed, thank goodness.
A Mr. Pinckney is described as "a great raconteur," and a Mr. Bradbury simply as "a Virginia gentleman" on their respective gravestones. One local gentleman of means was "a hunter and a salt water fisherman, a respected employer, a loyal friend, a loving husband, a generous father, and an affectionate grandfather." Another "listened well and counseled wisely, with warmth, humor, and love." The memorializers chose their words carefully.
Children who died young are represented by small headstones, sometimes surrounded by several Tonka Toy trucks and cars, as if the child were still playing at the beach, and some of the adult graves are decorated not with the usual chrysanthemums or artificial roses but with seashells. Recent graves may be planted with euonymous or another pretty ground-cover. I saw a camelia laid on the grave of a beloved grandfather. Some families seem to have planted a special tree like a cypress at the bequest of the deceased or of his or her relatives. There are no weeping willows in the St. Helena annex cemetary. Some sets of graves are in regimented rows, some apart from all the others, like row houses in Charleston or like a suburb near a city. Some graves distinguish themselves or their occupants by the marble slab’s being raised over a brick base, and some proclaim their importance with a headstone that sprawls over twenty or thirty feet, with arms to embrace a large or self-important family. Some of the gravestones are quiet or understated, on purpose. The body language of some gravestones says "New" or "Pure," and some says "Prematurely Aged," or "Distressed," or "Antiqued." Since this is not an ancient cemetery like the one around St. Helena’s Church, the stones start with birth dates in the 1870s, though some are from recognizably older Beaufort families, like the DeTrevilles, who have been here since the eighteenth century. Other families that appear often in Larry Rowland’s magisterial history of Beaufort County include the Pinckneys, the VonHartens, the Rhetts, the Verdiers, and the Trasks. Tombstones all seem to be of marble or granite, but I guess that has always been true. I was told that marble holds up better than granite in Beaufort humidity, but I had better not say that without authority.
My favorite memorial is so well-written it makes you wish for the return of the dead, and it happens to have been written by a gentleman I know, about the wife of a friend of mine:
"Bright, intelligent, and wonderfully educated, talented in music and literature, she was a lady of exquisite taste, grace, elegance, and fervor for life. A faithful and loving wife, a caring a nurturing mother, a loyal and devoted friend, she brought joy into the lives of everyone she knew.
Graceful, poised, and determined, she pursued life with candor, frankness, and a keen, enduring sense of good humor. She lived in happiness and died peacefully." Without a memorial cliché in them, those words are one of the most beautiful, thoughtful commentaries on a the life of a good human being I have ever read.
No comments:
Post a Comment