My go-to for a graveyard is old and sometimes seemingly forgotten. Most probably, the relatives of the buried are long gone themselves and no one is there to tend the graves. So, time takes old and these places simply slip out of the consciousness of society. Not through callousness, just the way things go. However, I visited a very modern one very recently.

There were people coming and going. Fixing their loves ones graves. Putting new flowers down and polished the headstones. And the one thing that really struck me, which I had never really thought about before was how much love there is in graveyards and cemeteries.

Hundreds of flowers dotted about and the devotion people have to visit their loved ones on various occasions reminded how adored people are. One grave even had a happy birthday balloon tied to it. It made me smile inside because even though these people are dead and buried, their family/friends/whoever still carry them in their hearts. The power of love and devotion really knows no bounds sometimes.

Someone said to me recently that people only truly die when the last person whispers their name and that is so true.

Life is always full of meeting and partings. Just the way it is. However, the people we meet all leave an impression (hopefully a good one). And even though the old graveyards, I tend to visit, are full of markers dating back hundreds of years they still allow people’s names to be said into the ether and possibly the people there never truly die.

-Ann B-