We as Americans live in the land of "everlasting youth" or we like to think we do. We have become a people obsessed with retaining or regaining youth: wrinkle creams, hair colour, weight loss pills, diets etc. We usually spend our entire lives chasing the phantom of youth until death catches us unaware......... We have a great fear of death as a people.
We would rather not talk about it. It is considered morbid to talk about death. Children are kept from funerals for fear of damaging them psychologically ... I believe our fascination with Halloween is a actually an attempt to make it (our mortality) something fun. We like things to be fun. So All Hallow's Eve becomes a time to go from house to house getting candy for youngsters or getting drunk at Halloween Parties for adults.......
Even in death when we must face our mortality we want the dead to appear as though they are sleeping. We went them embalmed pumped full of formaldehyde with lipstick and rouge. We have a great difficulty accepting death for what it actually is: a rather somber affair. We dont even want to wear dark clothing to funerals. We want to don something "bright" or "Cheerful". Few of us have grown up knowing how natural death actually is. We let funeral parlors handle our dead. We even want our funerals to be "up beat" in order to "cheer up" those present. So we choose songs to make us feel good.
I remember when I first moved to Germany in the 1980s, I saw a coloring book for children with images of graves and placing flowers on graves. I thought to myself, how strange that is. I then learned that at the time few dead were embalmed outside of the United States as it is indeed superfluous (not to mention environmentally hazardous). Who wants carcinogens in their water table? not me.
When we visit cemeteries on memorial day it's to bring artificial flowers and leave (I remember relating in Germany that we take artificial silk or plastic flowers to our graves and I was met with disbelief)....... Our cemeteries are mostly cared for by landscapers. Cemeteries prefer flat stones so that rider mowers can ride over the top more easily. In the days when I used to run, I ran through cemeteries in Germany. They were always busy places. I remember very old men and women (some in their 90s) riding their bikes there and bringing flowers and plants to decorate graves. They would sit and visit on benches. It was a social place. The German word for cemetery is "Friedhof" literally a "Peace Yard" and they truly are peaceful places. I was most amazed one night walking with a friend when to my right I saw hundreds of flickering lights through the trees.........I was stunned! "What is that?!!" I asked incredulously? She said, "Oh that's a Catholic cemetery". I later learned that each grave had a lantern and contained a 7 day candle. Traditionally, people there go to the cemetery on Sunday afternoon. A beautiful tradition one worthy of emulation.
My elderly neighbor who in 1991 was in his early 90s every day would don a tie and jacket and attach a wagon to his motorbike filled with flowers, plants or evergreens in winter. One day I asked him where he went every day. He said, "I go to see my wife!" I assumed he went to see her in a home. He said, "she has been dead since 1963".....................
Let us remember our dead today and all through November....
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