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Friday, May 26, 2006
We Can Make It a Noble Cause
I just drove past our local cemetary where people were visiting and decorating graves in preparation for the Memorial Day weekend. I have never been a grave decorator. Most of my family is buried in Kansas, and I remember knowing that my grandfather and great aunt would decorate relatives' graves each Memorial Day. For some reason, my parents never took me to do that. I had a couple of friends who were buried here in Colorado but I've never been to their graves since their funerals.
My baby is buried in a cemetary near here. I rarely go to the site. I did go for awhile. Once, around the time of a holiday, I saw flowers at the marker of the baby next to my son's, and I had a pang of guilt. I must not have loved my baby, Brian, enough to show it by bringing him flowers. Then I came to my senses and realized that the only people who would benefit by my gift of flowers would be the florist and me - mostly the florist, since I had no need to decorate this plot of earth.
In the beginning, the grave site was a place where I talked with Brian and cried, but I could only do that for so long. I felt his presence for awhile, but then I started feeling that he and I had moved on and there was no longer any need for me to visit a spot on the earth that held a marker with Brian Craig Goff's name on it.
I was thinking about why I no longer need to visit Brian's grave, and I remembered that, after I had recovered from the depression I experienced after his death and the premature birth of his twin brother, I decided that I was going to volunteer at hospice to be with others so that they wouldn't have to feel the alone-ness that I felt at the time of my baby's death. I did volunteer massage therapy at hospice for a few years, and it was one of the best experiences of my life. Then a time came when I was done with that work, and I began to take on the cause of social justice. Helping others at hospice, working on myself to become a more compassionate and clear person, TRYING to work to bring about awareness of injustice to others - that is where I feel that I am serving Brian. He doesn't need flowers.
We think of Memorial Day weekends as a three day weekend where the weather is getting warmer and we can go somewhere, party, have a barbeque. Some people will spend the day honoring our veterans with parades and grave decorations. I would like to suggest that we allow this to be a time to remember all of the death and suffering that war and violence have caused over the centuries and to, instead of only helping florists and flag makers profit from our loss, consider doing action that will bring more peace to the world. When a grieving mother asks "What noble cause?", may the answer be that those who died gave their lives to wake us up to do something!
(Photo from my prolific and soon-to-be - if not already- famous cousin, Larry G. Blackwood. Hawkline Photography)
posted by Carol at 11:57 AM
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