Memorial Day and more
Posted: May 27th, 2008, 4:12 pm
<center>Memorial Day
and more...</center>
Yesterday, Monday. 26 May, SooZen and I did an unusual thing.. we kinda celebrated Memorial Day. I say 'kinda' because we didn't attend any ceremonies or events and didn't put a flag up on our roof. No, we went to Phar Lepht's Ft Bliss National Cemetery to visit the gravesites of both our fathers.
We've, of course, stopped in and look at them before but this being Memorial Day, the cemetery was packed with folks for a ceremony of some sort or another... the cemetery lined with the red, white and blue, even small versions in front of every headstone. It was quite a picture (above). Due to some high winds the night before several of the small flags had fallen over which gave the cemetery crew some shuffling to do... busily picking them up if they would not hold there own. Soo asked one of the attendees if she could have one for our Down's boy. "Sure! No problem."
My father's gravesite (and my mother's) were closest so we located it (same headstone, different inscriptions) and SooZen took a picture. It was neat that his flag still stood despite the earlier winds.
My dad had passed in 1965 as noted on the bottom of the headstone. I was 20 years old and in Navy bootcamp when he had his last heart attack. He was a very cool, laid back soul and I missed my older age with him...
On the back of his headstone is my mother's inscription, She is buried directly behind her husband, This picture is an earlier one but nothing has changed except for the flags and landscaping of the cemetery -
We knew where Soo's daddy was... it hadn't been that long since we'd been there. We took a leisurely stroll in the mid-morning sun. It was a pleasant day and we saw several folks visiting the graves of their own lost ones.
Once we found Robert R. Ellsion's gravesite we were again brought to smiles upon seeing that his personal Memorial Day flag was still put, too. There was something about that... perhaps a subtle message or ...? Whatever it was it added to the already nice day we were having. We both miss Bob, as he preferred to be called by friends. He had an incredible life... one that he documented for his children. He was a Pearl Harbor survivor and Soo's Snippet,
urple Heart" quotes some of the experiences of that fateful day in Hawaii.
After paying our silent respects, we decided since we were so close that we would go see an old friend of ours that passed a few years ago - Dennis Kurtz. I've often thought of writing some sort of tribute to Dennis... he was an interesting person. Retired Dental Tech in the Army, having served in Viet Nam. After he got out I don't believe he ever cut his hair again... not even his beard. He was a cartoonist... even did his own two books of cartoons. He also was terribly interested in old collectibles. You know the types... things you find in antique stores or 'trash & treaure palaces.' He loved to wheel and deal!
Well, anyway we had only been to his gravesite once before... about a month after we had learned that he died. I could've sworn that I knew exactly where his headstone was but we both walked row after row and couldn't find him. Soo joked that he just didn't want to be bothered with any visitors that day. I believe that.
This was an earlier pic of old Dennis' final resting place -
An interesting thing happened on our way over to find Dennis. A cemetery pick-up pulled up next to us and the driver asked if we were the people looking for the Revolutionary War soldier's grave. "No... we just came from my father's gravesite..." Soo answered. But I asked him "Where is this grave?" I mean the Revolutionary War wasn't even close to anyone buried here...
"He's right over there... where you see two flags.." the fellow said.
"Where'd he come from?" I was really curious...
"They just reinterred him and his wife about a month ago. They found their graves in a small town in Texas and chose to rebury them in a National Cemetery." He told us that there were about 600 soldiers from that war who had moved to Texas and those in the know have located all but around 200-250 of them. Historians are a strange and wonderful breed of folks! Hats off to them.
Soo and I walked over and I took these two pictures -
With only what's written on their headstones, it shows that the soldier's wife, Mary Magdalena (What did Johann call her : Mary? Magdalena? maybe Maggie?) was about 3 months older than Johann (did she just call him Joe? "Joe, supper's almost ready. You better clean up!"). Johann outlived his loved one by two years. For the both of them to have lived until their mid-70's around 170 years ago tells me that they must've been pretty damn healthy.
Well, that was about it for the Memorial Day, National Cemetery outing for SooZen and myself. We headed on out to the car. It wouldn't be long before the ceremonies would conclude and the streets would be crowded with autos going here and going there. We took the long way home and talked about how different that was for us. Like I said this was not typical of us at all. But given our age I reckon it's time for us to pay our respects to those who have fallen before us... waaay before us... including those from the Revolutionary War. What a long strange (and wonderful) trip its been...
Cecil
27 May 2008
and more...</center>
Yesterday, Monday. 26 May, SooZen and I did an unusual thing.. we kinda celebrated Memorial Day. I say 'kinda' because we didn't attend any ceremonies or events and didn't put a flag up on our roof. No, we went to Phar Lepht's Ft Bliss National Cemetery to visit the gravesites of both our fathers.
We've, of course, stopped in and look at them before but this being Memorial Day, the cemetery was packed with folks for a ceremony of some sort or another... the cemetery lined with the red, white and blue, even small versions in front of every headstone. It was quite a picture (above). Due to some high winds the night before several of the small flags had fallen over which gave the cemetery crew some shuffling to do... busily picking them up if they would not hold there own. Soo asked one of the attendees if she could have one for our Down's boy. "Sure! No problem."
My father's gravesite (and my mother's) were closest so we located it (same headstone, different inscriptions) and SooZen took a picture. It was neat that his flag still stood despite the earlier winds.
My dad had passed in 1965 as noted on the bottom of the headstone. I was 20 years old and in Navy bootcamp when he had his last heart attack. He was a very cool, laid back soul and I missed my older age with him...
On the back of his headstone is my mother's inscription, She is buried directly behind her husband, This picture is an earlier one but nothing has changed except for the flags and landscaping of the cemetery -
We knew where Soo's daddy was... it hadn't been that long since we'd been there. We took a leisurely stroll in the mid-morning sun. It was a pleasant day and we saw several folks visiting the graves of their own lost ones.
Once we found Robert R. Ellsion's gravesite we were again brought to smiles upon seeing that his personal Memorial Day flag was still put, too. There was something about that... perhaps a subtle message or ...? Whatever it was it added to the already nice day we were having. We both miss Bob, as he preferred to be called by friends. He had an incredible life... one that he documented for his children. He was a Pearl Harbor survivor and Soo's Snippet,
urple Heart" quotes some of the experiences of that fateful day in Hawaii.After paying our silent respects, we decided since we were so close that we would go see an old friend of ours that passed a few years ago - Dennis Kurtz. I've often thought of writing some sort of tribute to Dennis... he was an interesting person. Retired Dental Tech in the Army, having served in Viet Nam. After he got out I don't believe he ever cut his hair again... not even his beard. He was a cartoonist... even did his own two books of cartoons. He also was terribly interested in old collectibles. You know the types... things you find in antique stores or 'trash & treaure palaces.' He loved to wheel and deal!
Well, anyway we had only been to his gravesite once before... about a month after we had learned that he died. I could've sworn that I knew exactly where his headstone was but we both walked row after row and couldn't find him. Soo joked that he just didn't want to be bothered with any visitors that day. I believe that.
This was an earlier pic of old Dennis' final resting place -
An interesting thing happened on our way over to find Dennis. A cemetery pick-up pulled up next to us and the driver asked if we were the people looking for the Revolutionary War soldier's grave. "No... we just came from my father's gravesite..." Soo answered. But I asked him "Where is this grave?" I mean the Revolutionary War wasn't even close to anyone buried here...
"He's right over there... where you see two flags.." the fellow said.
"Where'd he come from?" I was really curious...
"They just reinterred him and his wife about a month ago. They found their graves in a small town in Texas and chose to rebury them in a National Cemetery." He told us that there were about 600 soldiers from that war who had moved to Texas and those in the know have located all but around 200-250 of them. Historians are a strange and wonderful breed of folks! Hats off to them.
Soo and I walked over and I took these two pictures -
With only what's written on their headstones, it shows that the soldier's wife, Mary Magdalena (What did Johann call her : Mary? Magdalena? maybe Maggie?) was about 3 months older than Johann (did she just call him Joe? "Joe, supper's almost ready. You better clean up!"). Johann outlived his loved one by two years. For the both of them to have lived until their mid-70's around 170 years ago tells me that they must've been pretty damn healthy.
Well, that was about it for the Memorial Day, National Cemetery outing for SooZen and myself. We headed on out to the car. It wouldn't be long before the ceremonies would conclude and the streets would be crowded with autos going here and going there. We took the long way home and talked about how different that was for us. Like I said this was not typical of us at all. But given our age I reckon it's time for us to pay our respects to those who have fallen before us... waaay before us... including those from the Revolutionary War. What a long strange (and wonderful) trip its been...
Cecil
27 May 2008
