Memorial Day

“Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.” 2 Corinthians 3:17



As we get ready to celebrate Memorial Day weekend, I thought I would share with you my ties to the cemetery.


My Nanna was very serious about caring for her husband’s burial site. She would trim the weeds from around the headstone and clean the granite. She would take flowers for all the major holidays and remembrances or just for no reason at all. I recall there being a border of white rock at one time, bordering the headstone. I remember Nanna’s birth date was already there.


I was Nanna’s tagalong, so I spent a lot of time at the cemetery. I would walk down from my great-grandpa’s grave and try to find where some other acquaintances were buried. There were headstones in the area that had pictures on them, and I was always fascinated by them. Before we would leave the cemetery, Nanna would drive me by the big statue of the Indian man, who I would later learn was a relative of some of my school friends. He had his hands folded at his waist and they often held a little bouquet of flowers. There was a local myth about what would happen if you put a penny in there.


I remember the section separated from the rest of the cemetery by a white fence. The baby graves.


There was also an entire row of identical headstones where members of the Royal Air Force were buried.


I was also nearly attacked several times by killdeers who had their nests in the area.


All of these memories were relived last year when me and the boys volunteered to place Memorial Day flags at veteran graves in our cemetery.

Now we don’t have any family members in the local cemetery, but I recognize some of the names of families we know. We searched for veteran markers and the kids read some of the things they saw on the stones like “mother”, “father”, or “our baby”.


We don’t have a big Indian statue, but we have an angel.  She's missing a finger. 

Today was flag setting out day, and on our second pass, we noticed a very angry killdeer in our way.

Then we heard something behind us and another one was coming at us from behind. We looked closer and found four eggs amongst the headstones.

Then we quickly left the birds to calm down.


My 6YO found a statue of Jesus on one grave and said, “Look!! Here’s where Jesus DIED!”

Then we went to an area where the cemetery maintenance crew was working and a shovel was laid across a couple of graves by the road. “He must have been a farmer!” my 8YO concluded.


Needless to say, a good time was had by all.


Hope that you’re honoring our veterans in however you choose to celebrate this weekend. Go out and enjoy your freedom and your salvation. Both of those have been paid for!