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REQUIESCAT IN PACE

By Marilyn Armstrong on 02/01/2014 • ( 19 )

Daily Prompt: Happy Endings

by michelle w. on February 1, 2014

Photographers, artists, poets: show us THE END.

The beautiful old tombstones at the Revolutionary War cemetery downtown mark the resting places of heroes of every war plus the regular citizens from mill workers to mill owners. In this last piece of earth they inhabit, all are finally at long last, equal. R.I.P.

Other Entries:

‹ DULCIMER – HAUNTING MY DREAMS

HARRIET TUBMAN (1820 – 1913) ›

Categories: #Photography, Autumn, Blackstone Valley, Nature, Seasons

Tags: #Photography, Daily prompt, graveyard, happy endings, RIP, tombs, tombstones

19 replies

litadoolan
02/02/2014 • 05:56

so much food for thought in this post! There is an old necropolis in Edinburgh with stone of a similar colour. Funny how the end seems to be commemorated in a universal way across the globe!

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- Marilyn Armstrong
  02/02/2014 • 10:50
  
  I suspect it’s at least partly because stone is universally available except in a few environments where I suppose they have to come up with a different marker. One can but wonder how many civilzations disappeared without a trace for lack of building in stone. Wood disappears, as does adobe and other mud-based building materials. Jericho was barely detectible for that reason. Just something to ponder.
  
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  - litadoolan
    02/02/2014 • 10:55
    
    gosh. didn’t think of Jericho in those terms. brilliant insight.
    
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    - Marilyn Armstrong
      02/02/2014 • 10:59
      
      I wish it were mine, but archeologists have long recognized that there is a strong possibility that many civilizations have never been discovered simply because they built their world of wood and mud, not stone. In Africa, they now believe that several large civilizations came and went leaving nothing to dig up. The climate and building materials conspire to erase all traces. It makes me wonder about what else might have been. Good fodder for science fiction writers 🙂
      
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Swoosieque
02/01/2014 • 19:29

This picture reminds me that I had a friend, while living in Tucson, and we drove way out (I do not know the location) but there was an old, family, graveyard, with a wrought iron fence (like in the old movies) around the grave stones. We respectfully entered the graveyard, laid down a blanket and proceeded to have a vegetarian lunch in the company of these long-forgotten souls. Nothing spooky nor disrespectful, but visiting the long-forgotten ones. It was very peaceful and in a way, comforting.

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- Marilyn Armstrong
  02/01/2014 • 20:00
  
  It used to be common to picnic in graveyards. It was a visit with family and friends and no one viewed it as weird or spooky. Maybe it’s all the silly ghost/horror movies and books that have made people so uncomfortable around the dead … but it’s a pretty recent phenomenom. I’m just a few years older than you and I remember when it wasn’t like this.
  
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  - Swoosieque
    02/01/2014 • 20:02
    
    I remember that too, visiting grandparents etc… nowadays, I think people are too busy to be bothered.
    
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    - Marilyn Armstrong
      02/01/2014 • 20:06
      
      And scared, too. I remember when I was house hunting and we found a lovely house with a big plot of land … 5 or 6 acres. I liked it a lot. It had a very tiny, old graveyard on the property … a family burial site probably from the 1700s. My son wouldn’t go into it. At all. Not even near it. I know he’s a Stephen King fan, but there’s such a thing as taking it too seriously. I tried to reason with him, but he was — sorry about the pun — completely spooked. He didn’t get it from me OR his father. He came up with that stuff entirely on his own.
      
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      - Swoosieque
        02/01/2014 • 20:15
        
        This made me smile, just think of all those “ghost adventures” t.v. shows and the like, making scaredy cats out of people!
        
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        Marilyn Armstrong
        02/01/2014 • 20:45
        
        I think they really did. I know it sounds silly. It IS silly. But people are very silly and very creeped out about death. Like Garry and snakes, me and spiders. It’s not rational.
        
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