Divining the Stones

Nothing says death like a bunch of well-dressed people in dark colors on a bucolic grassy slope. Such is the nature of cemeteries. A place that tries to bring structure to the structureless and resolution to something that can’t be resolved. Cemeteries are especially odd when several funerals are going on at once. Like a public park, each family out for a grief picnic.

There are few things as intimate as death. It's extremely personal, so the notion of a big collective container for a bunch of bodies/souls that have no obvious connection to each other is pretty weird. Like a large, outdoor Public Storage for dead people. Maybe death is so huge we need to deal with it collectively. I do find it strange that the whole enterprise is organized and arranged by headstone. To reduce the energy, mystery, joy, hurt, longing and confusion of a human life to an entrance and an exit date. “I blew in on July 9th 1932, and took off on September 7th 2013. I was a father, a brother, a beloved son.” Really? That's how you’re going to leave it? Don’t you want to let us know what you thought or felt? Tell us your favorite flavor of ice cream or what you didn't like about your face. Come on, tell me something. I want to know what made you you.

And that right there is a bunch of writer bullshit. A desire to say, “Hey, sit down for a minute on that little bench and read about what it was like to be me." But that's not what headstones are for. I realized this a few years back at my ex-Mother in Law's funeral, which was held at Eden Memorial Park out in the San Fernando Valley. 

It was an emotional day. My guard was down and I was feeling a bit death-softened. There were several funerals going on, and even though we got there early we had to park far away. I forgot something in the car and had to go back for it. As I walked back toward the chapel, I looked around at all the different headstones, then went up to one and stood in front of it. And just like that, I got it. I finally understood the purpose of the headstone. It was saying, "I did it! I did the thing! I was here! Me, Morris Leibowitz, I played the big room!" And then the next one called out, "Me too! I did it too!" And then they all started calling out:

“I did it for seventy-three years!”

“I did it for ninety-five!”

“I only did it for twenty-two, but I did it!”

“I did it for sixty-eight, they called me Rita.”

 “I did it for fifty-four, they called me Sol.”

“They called me Evelyn. I did it too!”

And I realized that everything I thought was so important didn’t matter at all. It wasn’t about achievement or legacy. It wasn’t even about a well-lived life full of love and kindness. Sure, that was swell, but the real accomplishment was simply having gotten in the game. Be you lucky or unlucky. Wise or foolish.  Beautiful or common. Blessed or cursed. The only thing that mattered was that you had made it. Had lived some version of this strange and mysterious thing we call life. That you had done your time and earned the right to call out with everyone else, “I did it. I did the thing. I was here!"