Nobody’s Opinion: Since I spent most of last week with the most horrible expression of,
“Oh Nooooo!!! We’re all going to be “rationed” off!” look on my face…I thought it only fitting that I go look at graves sites and start thinking about my upcoming fate.
I thought of this wonderful pastime while I was watching the scene on TV, in the movie
Schlinlers List…you know…the scene where they make all the Jewish prisoners take off all their clothes outside, and run pass the doctors who look at how well they run, and then weed out the unhealthy ones, the old ones, and the sick ones…to be killed.
You’ve got to admit- the Nazi’s were straightforward when it came to “rationing.” They didn’t mess around. The world has “perfected” this concept, and it’s much more civilized…they now call it “Universal Health Care.”
And the Universal Health Care doctors won’t have to sit out in the sun, they will have nice new offices, with brand new data processing Apple computers!
That’s why I thought…
god…get me out of here before I drive myself crazy.
So today, my lesser half (he’s lesser because he’s younger, and limping at the moment) and I went to look at some graves and walk the dogs at the same time. The dogs were pretty excited to be in a grave yard, let me tell ya. The way my dogs hopped out of the car and ran around you would have thought they were in puppy heaven, filled with a nirvana of Brad Pitt doggie scents!
So many stones! So
little time!
Actually, spending a boring Sunday afternoon at a cemetery…looking at all the old booogers with their giant tombstones was pretty fun…and we have one of the best cemeteries here in St. Louis to flip around in.
It’s called
Calvary…and for a good reason. There are lots of civil war guys, like General Sherman, and Dred Scott, buried here.
Then there’s William Clark, and those German beer kings, Busch and Lemp.
But I was
most impressed by seeing Tennessee Williams, all by himself. He had a really nice BIG headstone that said in big letters:
Poet.
My husband and I just couldn’t believe it. To think--- not four feet away from the car, was the man who made Marlon Brando famous:
”
STEEEEELLLLLLAAAAAA!!!!!”
That’s about all I remember of that movie.
The other thing I remember about him is Paul Newman in “
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.” Where you couldn’t even
conceive of
any man fighting with Elizabeth’s Taylor when she had that white dress on....
But then, Williams was not exactly into…women.
I must admit, I was never a big fan of Tennessee Williams, and he was never a fan of St. Louis, although he was born here. I read somewhere that he couldn’t wait to get out…and good thing he did, or the world would now never have the New Marlon Brando Hotel Island complex to go to. The great ripple of life is really being underestimated right now, but that’s another blog.
Back to death.
As you might know, nobody goes to cemeteries anymore, especially the old ones. And that’s a shame because every tombstone has a story…and you begin to notice a pattern…people want to be buried with their own kind.
The Irish with the Irish, the Italians with the Italians, the Priests with the Priests…
Walk through plot 4…and you find McNamara’s, O’ Connors, O’Reilly’s, Mallorys... just about all the Irish that came down from New York are buried here, only to die from the 1849 cholera epidemic.
On one grave it said, “Michael Maloney was born in Tipperary, Ireland.” As if to say he was
really sorry he never got back. Like you never KNEW he was Irish with a name like Maloney.
As if by mentioning it on his grave
someone from the old town would remember him...
"Aggg...louk heeerrre Bobby...isn't this the little Mikie that used to frug us back of the barn off Barnaby Road?"
They don’t make tombstones like they use to. Back when America was in its “industrial” age, the men who founded big companies competed in death. They wanted to see who could build the biggest mausoleum
You think YOUR tombstone is high?---Well, beat THIS sucker!
One guy even had two gigantic sphinx’s put on the front door.
Now, the bodies are piling up in California because poor
nobodies have the money to even
bury their dead. And so what do they do with them? Burn them? You use to have the freedom to just bury your parents in your back yard...remember those days?
Of
course you don't! That was before someone thought of putting them all the bodies in one place for a fee!
Well..there's a whole
nother blog.
I, personally, being an inventive kind of person (due to my dad who invented an object called the “tipper timer:” that of course never got licensed) would make visiting grave stones into a whole new venture.
I would rent out I-Phones with recordings…and as you walked by each grave you could just click on a number, and you would get the dead person’s picture up, or a video, and then hear the biography of the person:
Something like this:
Here lies Anna B. McKinney. She liked to play poker, and was considered a nymphomaniac in her younger days. Later she marred A Civil War general named Piccadilly, who was killed by his mule coming back from the war.
She had eight children, by twenty men…Adolph, Zia, Pia, Mia, Kia, Snuffy, Bobby, and Mildred, whom later became the famous singer with Al Jolson.She washed 4,900,000,038 loads of laundry in her own lifetime.
She will be missed. Born: 1812…Died…1902.
She also murdered her late husband by setting him on fire, but was acquitted.
You could charge twenty bucks a tape and make some money. Talk about entertaining! You could even sell the complete set of historical burial records on a disc!
I now copyright this idea…and all I need are two witnesses of my idea---
Sign…below:
I ……hereby understand Joyanna’s Adams for a taped recording of burial sites, wonderful idea completely.
Name…….
Date……..
Thank you.
Hey, if we are all going to die sooner than later, I should make some money. Its BOUND to be the next best stock!
We’ll trademark the company, and call it… “Dead Right!”
Now, go away, I’m now planning my funeral…hmmmm….
“
Here lies a really crazy lady…who was killed by the Illuminati, and whose brain has been frozen for further study…”
Labels: Humor