Sunday Stream (222) ~ Life in the Concordia Cemetery

[mtmynd]

Life in the Concordia Cemetery


on
El Dia de Muertos
or
The Day of the Dead

* * * * *

There's a lot more dead people on this planet than there is the living... and those of us that feel we're still alive better do a damn good job of it because everyone of us air seeking, food eating humans will be dead one hell of a lot longer than we'll be living.

Yesterday Soo & I, after having a wonderful Mexican meal at the old L&J restaurant, which is right across the street from the Concordia Cemetery, decided to enter it's open gates in the late afternoon of Halloween Eve.

Today, the day after, many parts of the world celebrate their dead with various names of the celebrations but the intent is the same – remembering those that have passed before us, family members and friends along with those casual acquaintances that left a mark on us for some reason or another.

[protected grave of John Wesley Hardin]

John Wesley Hardin. Now there's a name many of us may have heard somewhere in our lives. Bob Dylan wrote a song closely named after him – John Wesley Harding... he added the 'g' to the name and named the album with this song after him. Now this character, John Wesley Hardin, despite Dylan's song, was a mean man who reportedly killed over 40 men. That's how he earned the moniker of “The Meanest Man in Texas.” John was noted as saying he never killed anyone who didn't need killing. Oddly enough his father was a Methodist preacher and his mother was known as a gentle and cultured woman.

Let us remember John Wesley Hardin today as we view his grave marker in the Concordia Cemetery -

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Not far from that grave lies the final resting place of one Martin M'Rose, The Polish Cowboy, who was killed in Phar Lepht on the U.S. border with Ciudad Juarez, where he ran off to with his wife, Beulah, to evade some criminal charges. Seems his wife somewhere along the way met up with John Wesley Hardin, who lived and worked as a lawyer (another story) in this dusty border town. M'Rose was lured back across the border knowing his wife was involved with John Wesley Hardin. He was gunned down after crossing the border by some lawmen.


His grave is some ten feet or so from Hardin's grave.

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But not everyone that has lived and died on our fair planet has a history, at least one that has survived passed the memory of their mothers or fathers, sisters or brothers.

Let us pay a brief memory to 'Baby Taylor' who came into this life on July 2, 1900 and departed the same day, July 2, 1900, leaving no last name, no memory of a mother or father.

Or how about those that have breathed in the very air we are breathing in today who's memory is not even short and to the point as Baby Taylor's... whose tombstone has weathered the elements leaving but a guess as to whose remains lie below the marker, the only hint remaining of their life -

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Let's not forget Salome M. Sanchez who was born on 22 Octubre 1853, twelve years before the U.S. Civil War and lived a long life that ended 14 Julio 1957, only a few months before Salome would celebrate his/her 104 years. Imagine the stories this person passed away with and the lessons that were learned in this life. Amazing.

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From a life so long to a life shortened to 2 years and 9 months, the baby Maria was buried here on June 28, 1913 with this 96 year old memory left behind for us to read by her loving and saddened parents who never got to see Maria grow up and enjoy life as they did. Heartbreaking.

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Or the mystery of Anastacio Infantes, 'unknown', having left life on 4-04-39, over 70 years ago and nothing was known about the man other than the name. Some good Samaritan in honor of El Dia de Muertos has left a small bouquet of blue plastic flowers near this headstone to bring a touch of color to the arid landscape, shaded by an extremely old salt cedar tree that have survived the area far longer than any one human.

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And finally let us remember Diamond Dick!!

Who could forget a name like that? How did this man, Ernest St. Leon, a Texas Ranger, get that nickname, Diamond Dick? Legend has it that Ernest was the son of a French refugee and was born in San Antonio, Texas. He eventually joined the Texas Rangers in the 1880's. It was there he got his nickname from his habit of wearing diamonds on his uniform. No mention of where the diamonds came from... Diamond Dick died from a gunshot wound that pierced his lung during a gun fight and later died from it.

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~ FIN ~

cecil
01 Nov 09

[judih]

sun shines bright on gravestones
remembering to remember
those who knew us not

[mtmynd]

well said, my friend... well said, indeed!

thanks, judh nir oz. nice seeing your smiling face here today (and any other day).

[Artguy]

Ah the dead and their stories...you live the wild west with plenty of long tales of gamblers, killers and questionable lawmen...fodder for many entertaining movies...my faves being Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid as well as Pat Garrett and Billy The Kid...We have a cemetery a couple of blocks from here where I have taken many a walk..I imagine one day I too shall reside there. I have left instructions that I am to be marked with a simple uncarved boulder with a bronze plaque simply stating my name dates born and died and Artist.....

[mtmynd]

nice idea for a tombstone... carved stone w/ a simple plaque... i like that idea. but Soo and I both have claimed cremation as our preferred method of bailing out of the system... kind of a shortcut to the old 'ashes to ashes, dust to dust'... however some memory of our life would be valid... both my own mother and Soo's father were cremated and still have a grave site. this old concordia is truly a rustic area. maybe i'll drop in some more photos showing the crudeness and simplicity of the place... a place still in use today.. something like over 60, 000 people's last spot.

thx, Kurt.

[Arcadia]

what a land, Cecil!! Curious feeling to read tumbas both in english and spanish. And love the cactus at the back of diamond dick´s grave!

Never went with my parents to cementerios when I was a kid. But I went with my granparents´s mother side (my mother yelled a lot with my grandmother each time because of that...! ). I remember I liked to visit with them the Oliveros´s cementerio where my grand-grand tumbas were. It was very natural for me to go there, loved the long rectilinear camino de tierra to the cemetery full of sembrados and little chicken criaderos (we always stopped in the viaje the vuelta to buy chickens with plumas! and eggs), and to be free to read stones while my grandmother was in charge of the flowers.

I have a waiting place somewhere upside my mother´s place but I also like the idea of ashes spreaded? in the Paraná, I´ll have to decide about it!

gracias for the stream & saludos!

Arcadia

[Artguy]

Who says a dead man tells no tales.....

[mtmynd]

muchas gracias, arcadia... nice story about your grandparents and the cemetery. both my parents are in a U.S. National Cemetery, here in my hometown.... the place being for the military is very well-groomed with nothing out of place.. more like a painting than a real place like the Concordia here, with it's tierra seco, cactus and even weeds here and there... it is kept up by volunteer help and public donations. Being such a large place, with divided areas for Chinese, Jews, Catholic, Buffalo Soldiers, French, Masons y muchas mas it's quite an interesting area and one that SooZ and I will return to.
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Yes, Kurt... those dead man tales speak to those who bother to listen... everyone has their story, no matter how great or how quiet they may be, and each of us send those stories into the ethers that surround us, like birds in flight seeking new skies...