All Saints Eve

Hello,

Because we are living close to their grave site, I thought we should do the Slovak thing and neaten and decorate the grave of Leroy’s parents. Saturday early evening seemed like the right time to me, but Leroy wanted to go earlier to be sure that we could see and find the stone. They are in a cemetery where all of the stones are flat and level with the ground. Leroy’s sister could give general directions.

Then it was a question of what to put on the stone. I thought we ought to do the candle and mum thing just as we has seen in Slovakia. When we were out and about for another reason we stopped at one store where I had still seen mums. They did indeed still have some. They were not choice, but tired and marked down to 2 for a dollar. We found six that still looked good enough. After we got them home, Leroy said, “What are you thinking to do just leave them out there for a few days and then plant them?”

“Yes,” I said, “and I thought we would light the candle just as we were there and then bring it home.”

In the meantime Leroy talked to someone who said the weather report stated Saturday was the last nice day for a while. So Leroy thought we should just go ahead and plant the flowers in the ground by the house here when it was still nice to do that. We scurried around and planted those six mums without taking them to the cemetery.

We got to the cemetery so early that we were able to find the grave, however Leroy was right it would have been next to impossible to find in the dark. We cleaned off the stone and trimmed the grass around it, but because it was still light there was no candle lighting. Not quite what I had in mind, but we did at least give it some care. Certainly it was not up to the Slovak standard.

Paula