Tag Archives: History

Stories from the Grave

You drive by an intersection and take notice of a weathered and worn wooden cross poking up from the ground. Around it are faded silk flowers, some tattered stuffed animals, burnt candles, and remnants of hand-written notes that resisted being carried away by the wind. You know someone died in that spot and someone else has been grieving there.

During a vacation to Chile a couple years ago, I saw elaborate memorial structures placed alongside many of that beautiful country’s roads. The shoulders were sporadically adorned with what looked like tiny, dollhouse-sized churches. Some were wooden, but most were little concrete buildings built upon concrete foundations. Inside, there were framed photographs, crucifixes, printed prayers, figurines, and candles. Flowers flanked the outsides. One display was remarkably huge—about six-feet square, with a foot-high iron gate enclosing the entire display. That one was further from the road than others I’d viewed, and I’m guessing it was on private property. Each miniature building I drove past, however, seemed to be permanently affixed to the ground.

In Chile, an animita is a place where people mourn the deceased, petition for help, and give thanks for answered prayers.

I remember that as a teenager I watched old western movies. Whenever one of the good cowboys was shot to death, his comrades did all they could to bury him. If they were on the run and in a hurry, they quickly covered him in rocks. If given a little more time, they dug a shallow grave, covered the body in dirt, and marked the site with a makeshift cross.

People have been memorializing the dead for centuries. Egyptian kings have their pyramids. In India, the Taj Mahal houses the body of an emperor’s beloved wife. Here in the United States, the wealthy erect mausoleums too, although they are admittedly much smaller. All of us will die, but only some of us will plan for our inevitable demise.

In the 1980s, a popular advertisement encouraged people to select the ingredients they wanted on their pizzas by answering: “What do you want on your Tombstone?” It made a normally serious topic light and fun . . . and, in particular, tasty. It was genius. The Tombstone Pizza Company name wasn’t easily forgotten, even all these years later. The ad worked in part because it made us face our own mortality for just a moment while we pondered how we wanted to be remembered. What would people say about us after our deaths?

Built in 1846, William Eddings Baynard’s mausoleum is the oldest standing structure on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina.

Frankly, if we don’t convey careful instructions or plan ahead of time, we aren’t the ones who decide what goes on our pizza or what gets written on our own granite tombstones. Let’s hope that the immortalizing words associated with us end up being written by someone who abides by our wishes or at least likes us enough to say nice things.

You can learn a lot about a person by visiting his or her gravesite. For some reason, that fun isn’t high on the list of any of my friends and family. Rarely does anyone ever want to join me in a stroll through a graveyard. Yes, I’ve actually asked family and friends to do that, especially during travel to foreign countries. Most often, the closest I come to walking hallowed ground turns out to be nothing more than a chance drive-by encounter on the way to some other point of interest.

The one time my husband, his sister and her husband humored me, we delicately tip-toed around the fresh, loose soil of above-ground graves in a church cemetery on the Leeward Island of St. Kitts. We visited long enough for me to take several photos.

An eternal resting place on St. Kitts overlooks the Atlantic Ocean.

When I noticed that my companions weren’t walking alongside or trailing behind me, I realized that they didn’t share my curiosity over the differences in Kittitian burial customs from those in the United States. I saw that my family was lingering near our rental car and I figured it was time to go. We hopped back into the new Honda CRV. Then we accidentally drove over a metal industrial anchor of some sort. After incurring over two thousand dollars in repair costs to the rental car, certain relatives don’t want to stop at cemeteries with me anymore.

That’s one explanation for why I, more cautiously, poked around the internet this month and found a variety of interesting memorials to share with you.

Elijah Jefferson Bond, the patentee of the Ouija board, was buried in an unmarked grave at Maryland’s Green Mount Cemetery in 1921. Eighty-seven years later, a Ouija board collector, enthusiast, and expert, Robert Murch, successfully located Bond’s grave.

Games can’t be played forever, or can they? (Photo, courtesy of Ryan Schweitzer, via findagrave.com)

Murch obtained all the necessary permissions and funds needed to erect a memorial headstone. He commissioned a clever and befitting design to honor the deceased Mr. Bond. Bond’s once unmarked gravesite could have been permanently forgotten, but that’s unlikely to happen now that he has an intriguing monument.

Yet, I wonder: would Bond have chosen to rest beneath a granite version of a game that encourages conversations with dead people?

Someone is bound to ask him, via a Ouija board, although it won’t be me. I don’t want to open that creepy door to the spirit world.

Princess Diana is buried on a private island on her Spencer family’s property. A temple inscribed with her name faces the island. Her brother’s words memorialize her this way:

We give thanks for the life of a woman I am so proud to be able to call my sister. The unique, the complex, the extraordinary & irreplaceable Diana whose beauty both internal and external will never be extinguished from our minds.

I think all those complimentary words would be well-received by Diana. The temple, in my opinion, is a bit much, but she was a princess. Most people wouldn’t expect anything less than extravagance like that for a woman loved throughout the world.

Another ideal tribute honors author Walter Lord. His gravesite is identified by a stone bench, inscribed with the names of his best-selling books, one of which was A Night to Remember, about the sinking of the Titanic. The welcoming setting invites visitors to rest for a little while, maybe even with one of Lord’s popular books in hand.

President Richard Nixon began his presidency with words that were later placed on his tombstone. It’s intriguing that his grave is absent a lofty title or noteworthy achievement. Instead, there’s simply a humble quote: “The greatest honor history can bestow is the title of peacemaker.”

That’s a nice thought for us mere mortals to aspire to.

The land beneath the dome in Jerusalem is revered by Christians, Jews and Muslims, although for different religious reasons.

Covering a rock where Muslims believe Muhammad ascended to heaven is a shrine known as The Dome of the Rock. In Jerusalem, it stands out from all other buildings. There’s no mistaking the ornate memorial, topped in gold. During a trip I took to Israel in 2014 with my church-family, Christians were not welcome within the shrine’s doors, so we appreciated the splendor from afar.

That was okay with me. I had another, personally more meaningful, tomb to visit. This other one, known as the Garden Tomb, was literally fit for a king. Not because it was extravagant or ornate or covered in gold. It was none of those things. There was nothing fancy about this other tomb. It was simply a cold, barren cave with a hard, stone floor. It was a tomb that long ago may have been customized to accommodate Jesus’s body. Some people believe that the King of Kings was too tall for His borrowed burial space and it had to be chiselled and lengthened to accommodate His height. Others more simply acknowledge that the Garden Tomb’s characteristics match historical records of Jesus’s burial.

Either way, this place in Jerusalem is where people come to pay homage to Jesus and to pray. I entered the solemn tomb and stood with my pastor and his wife. My pastor was weeping. In that moment, I recalled the torture Jesus endured before His death. I cried too. If anyone deserved a shrine or a temple, it was God incarnate Who sacrificed His life for the redemption of my sin.

The Garden Tomb. (Photo, courtesy of Chris Bixby)

The grounds surrounding Jesus’s burial tomb are full of flowers and plants, and there are many sitting areas that inspire personal reflection and prayer. Nature’s beauty helps comfort us in our grief. But the stark reality is that we mere mortals die. Those left behind visit gravesites, leave flowers, tenderly care for the little plots of earth where our loved ones rest. We continue in conversation with those departed. Our greatest comfort, however, comes from knowing we’ll see them again.

Before His own death, Jesus predicted, “We are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written by the prophets about the Son of Man will be fulfilled. He will be handed over to the Gentiles. They will mock him, insult him, spit on him, flog him and kill him. On the third day he will rise again.” (Luke 18:31)

“Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen!” (Luke 24:5-6)

Jesus has no tombstone that screams accolades. The most obvious hint of His importance, royalty, and divinity was added years after His burial place was discovered. Where a stone once blocked His tomb’s entrance is now a wooden door with an inscription: “He is Risen.”

Indeed. Conquering death is worth celebrating. “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (Jesus’s words from John 20:29.)

Happy Easter!

From One Extreme to Another

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“Kalamazoo to Timbuktu.” That song, recorded in the ‘50s by Mitch Miller, linked two locations together because of their individually unique names. Michiganders, like me, recognize the name of one city and wonder about the other. Where in the world is Timbuktu? Does it really exist? Or is it just part of an expression that we say when we’re exaggerating about a far-away place?

Those of us who think about Timbuktu envision a made-up land where no one lives; there are no roads, no public services, no bathrooms, no grocery stores or cushy conveniences for miles around. A place so remote, we relish the peace and quiet that we think we’ll find. We mention to friends of our upcoming travel plans by saying, “We’re goin’ to Timbuktu, in the middle of nowhere.”

But Timbuktu isn’t a popular destination for tourists. The city rests at the southern edge of the Sahara Desert in the country of Mali, and it has always been very hard to get to. Instead of planes, trains, and automobiles, think: boats, camels, and twenty hours in a four-wheel-drive vehicle. Without the benefit of that last luxury, early seventeenth century explorers were lured to their deaths by the legendary “city of gold.” Most of those adventurers were massacred and others died as a result of the harsh desert environment—particularly, scorching sun and no access to fresh drinking water. Timbuktu was, and is, nothing less than a tumultuous place in West Africa.

Gold is still associated with Timbuktu. Along with cotton, it accounts for 80% of Mali’s earnings from exported goods. But possessing an abundance of one of the earth’s most valuable commodities has not protected the country from poverty. Mali is among the world’s twenty-five poorest countries.

Part of the poverty problem began seven hundred years ago when Timbuktu’s resident king, Mansa Musa, gave away tons—literally, tons—of painstakingly-mined gold during his journey to Mecca. He gave so much to the poor as he encountered them along his route that the precious metal quickly lost value and the costs of other goods escalated. Today’s descendant residents of Timbuktu are so mad over the king’s actions that they won’t even speak his name. They blame him for having carelessly ruined their economy.

Control of Timbuktu repeatedly toggles amongst various militant groups and the Malain government. In 2012, Peter Gwin reported for National Geographic News that “Islamists have enforced a Taliban-style interpretation of sharia.” The extremists destroyed tombs and stole ancient manuscripts. They also “broke down the sealed holy inner door of the 15^th-century Sidi Yahya Mosque” which as Gwin further noted: “according to tradition, its opening would bring the end of the world.”

During the terrorists’ occupation, girls in Timbuktu couldn’t go to school and women had to wear burkas. According to Gwin, one father lost his twelve-year old son to the Islamist army. The young boy was tricked. He thought he would earn a bag of rice for his family by performing “manual labor at the Islamist base in the center of the city.” When the father found out that his child had inadvertently signed up for holy war, he tried to reason with the commander that his son was needed at home. In response the father was told, “You may have his body when he has fulfilled his duty to Allah.”

Tumultuous.

The U.S. Department of State names a number of the threatening operatives that are active in Mali. They include “al-Qaida in the Lands of Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), Ansar al-Dine, the Movement for Oneness and Jihad (MUJAO), and extremists tied to Al-Murabitun.”

Now there’s another group: Emirate of the Sahara. On January 16, 2016, they kidnapped a Christian surgeon and his wife from Burkina Faso—another of the world’s poorest countries. Dr. Ken Elliot and his wife, Jocelyn, moved there forty years ago to provide medical care to those in dire need. The kidnappers were suspected to be transferring the elderly couple, who are in their eighties, across the border and into Mali. Negotiations resulted in the release of Jocelyn on February 6, but little is publicly known about Dr Elliot’s current condition. Needless to say, he remains in great peril.

This month, we Americans look at our history. February–Black History Month–is a time when we think about where we came from and where we are headed. Black or White, Christian, Muslim, or other, how blessed are we to be able to openly pray for an end to evil, violence, oppression, and hatred?

Grin and Bare It

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I’m never more aware that I’m a day closer to death than when I’m melting like a freakish human dummy in House of Wax. Burning on the inside and drenched by sweat on the outside, I have zero tolerance for the slightest touch. Hands off! Don’t come near me. I’m about to self-combust. After all, what other purpose do damnable hot flashes serve than to dry up my internal organs until I disappear into a puff of smoke? One day, I may very well be reduced to a pile of dust. In an instant.

You men and younger ladies already have some idea of what we middle-aged women deal with. You’ve seen us trying to minimize contact with anything that restrains heat in our bodies. Off go our sweaters as we scoot to the edge of our seats and make more room for air flow. We could stand, but physical activity takes too much effort and makes us feel hotter.

A Smilebox photo by Kelly Bixby

Some of us are convinced that even the slightest amount of energy we expend in fanning ourselves may work against our attempts to snuff out the raging infernos. Desperate, we become as still as possible and resort to heavy panting—a technique perfected by dogs to cool down. We endure and survive, but in the heat of the moment, we are not glamorous at all.

We mature women have to figure out what we’re willing to do to minimize our discomfort. Exposing one of my solutions may be TMI. Let me just say that I’m often tempted to create a new Twitter hashtag: #HalfNakedAndWriting. Don’t worry, though, moms and dads (particularly mine). I won’t go public with that, because I don’t want to grab the attention of seedy characters hoping to find a provocative picture attached to the description. Instant popularity isn’t worth dealing with a bunch of stalkers. It would be nice, however, to commiserate with other women writers who have reached this milestone in the aging process.

Having lived with this curse for several years, I’d like to share some of the things I’ve learned. Men, I promise not to leave you out. Bear with me while I first explain why commonly recommended treatments are associated with long-term health risks. Then, I’ll reveal how you can safely help the woman you love to alleviate her symptoms.

Popular methods to reduce hot flashes can be detrimental to our health. For instance, a product called Estroven touts that it is “drug-free and estrogen-free***.” Truth in advertising perhaps, but connect those three asterisks to the information hidden in the fine print:

“***Estroven does not contain synthetic, animal or human-derived hormones.”

It sounds great, as if you’re completely avoiding the hormone estrogen. Except, if you keep researching, you’ll find that soy, a plant-based product, is listed as Estroven’s first and, therefore, most abundant ingredient, under none other than the title of “Warnings.”

What could be so bad about soy that it falls under a warning? Ingesting soy affects the levels of estrogen in our bodies and may play a role in a woman’s increased chance of developing breast cancer. In the article “Soy and Breast Cancer, What’s the Link?,” WebMD journalist Salynn Boyles reported:

“The concern about soy stems from the fact that most breast cancers are fueled by the female sex hormone estrogen. Just as the body produces estrogen, so do plants, and soy contains high amounts of estrogen-like chemicals called isoflavones. The research is unclear about how these plant-based estrogens impact the body’s own estrogen levels and breast cancer growth.” (1)

My own gynecologist recommends black cohosh as an acceptable option to reduce hot flashes. It’s known by many other names, most notably phytoestrogen. Surely any and all of those must be safe or my doctor wouldn’t suggest the herbal supplement in the first place?

Not necessarily. Scientists are still battling to determine if herbal supplements increase or decrease a woman’s chance of developing breast cancer. Boyles interviewed Dana Farber Cancer Center oncologist, Wendy Chen, MD, for an expert explanation. Chen indicated:

“A link between breast cancer and hormones is clear. Researchers think that the greater a woman’s exposure to the hormone estrogen, the more susceptible she is to develop breast cancer. Estrogen tells cells to divide; the more the cells divide, the more likely they are to be abnormal in some way, possibly becoming cancerous. We tell women with breast cancer to definitely avoid the [soy] supplements….Our message to the general public is that we really don’t know if supplements are safe because they haven’t been tested.”

Additionally, the American Heart Association concluded:

“The efficacy and safety of soy isoflavones for preventing or treating cancer of the breast…are not established; evidence from clinical trials is meager and cautionary with regard to a possible adverse effect. For this reason, use of isoflavone supplements in food or pills is not recommended.” (2)

We can opt not to take it in pill form, but have you noticed how prevalent soy is in our food products? Soy may be inherently natural, but it is unnaturally processed and added to many popular snack foods. It’s in M & Ms, granola bars, Oreos, chocolate covered raisins and pretzels, graham crackers, and gourmet popcorn. Sadly, all of which I have in my cupboard. Take a look in your own pantry and read a label or two. If soy is in your packaged food, you may see it noted as a type of warning in big bold print: “Contains: Soy.”

Men, there is no denying that your bodies have a little estrogen in addition to your much more abundant testosterone levels. Unknowingly, you may be taking in more estrogens through the foods you eat and even in the water you drink. I don’t want to cause anyone undue worry, but there is evidence that you also are at risk from environmentally introduced estrogens. (Take a look at environmentalhealthnews.org.)

One in eight women, and one in one thousand men, will be diagnosed with breast cancer. After being hit with that devastation—and too late in my opinion—many will be advised to avoid eating soy altogether.

The convenience of processed food is proving not to be worth the consequences on our health. Fitness guru Jillian Michaels offered practical advice when she was interviewed by CNN. She said, “If it doesn’t come out of the ground and it didn’t have a mother, don’t put it in your mouth.” (3)

Image created by Kelly Bixby, using Rhonna Designs

How bad must a woman’s symptoms be for her to adopt the use of steroidal estrogens? They are Known To Be Human Carcinogens! The National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) reports that its “National Toxicology Program has listed six substances in its Report on Carcinogens (RoC) that cause or may cause breast cancer in humans. These include: diethylstilbestrol, a synthetic form of estrogen that was used to prevent miscarriages; steroidal estrogens used for menopausal therapy; X-ray and gamma radiation; alcoholic beverages; tobacco smoking; and the sterilizing agent, ethylene oxide.” (4)

Do you read that above list and find it easy to accept that tobacco smoking may cause breast cancer? We’ve been bombarded with that knowledge for decades. Now the evidence is showing that using estrogens is risky and that we should think twice before indulging in a glass of wine. Ugh!

What can women do to get through an uncomfortable hot flash? Here are my top three recommendations:

• Embrace the fan. Based on my own experience, the instantly gratifying relief is worth the extra kilojoules, and there are many free or inexpensive options to choose from. When at home, junk mail serves as a great go-to device. Out grocery shopping? Pick up a weekly advertisement on your way into the store. Attending service? The church bulletin is handed right to you. Everywhere you go, proactively scan your immediate surroundings for emergency use of any decent cardstock. Or, channel Scarlett O’Hara and invest in something fancy and foldable. Still worried about expending too much energy? Pack a small, battery-operated fan in your purse.

• Dress in layers. Be prepared to strip down as far as public decency allows. Store your big, bulky sweaters at the bottom of the closet, and donate anything that has to be pulled over your head. Camis are the only exception, especially if you have teenagers at home. They don’t want to see you running around in anything less. Invest in clothing that has buttons or zippers all the way up and down. You’re worth an updated wardrobe.

• Rely on the man in your life. He can help with a short-term fix. Tilt your head to one side, lean in close to him, and enjoy a soothing moment as your significant other gently blows on your neck. It won’t take long for you to cool down, smile, and feel more connected to the one you love. Once you’ve relaxed—and if you and your spouse are lucky enough to be home alone when a hot flash strikes—consider the advantages to shedding all restrictive clothing.***

I think you may find that there’s nothing more natural, worry-free, and satisfying.
——————————–
***Proceed with caution; squelching one fire may ignite an entirely different one.

Notes:
(1) http://www.webmd.com/breast-cancer/features/soy-effects-on-breast-cancer?page=2
(2) http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/113/7/1034.full
(3) http://edition.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0901/03/hcsg.01.html
(4) http://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/assets/docs_a_e/environmental_factors_and_breast_cancer_risk_508.pdf

Additional Resource:
Breast cancer in men

Books and Death

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I recently read a blogpost reflecting on the death of author Terry Pratchett. Terry Pratchett…why did that name sound familiar to me?

The reflective blogger lived in the UK and noted that Pratchett was a best-selling English author of fantasy novels. I guess that’s why I hadn’t heard the news. He must be a bigger deal there than here across the pond. But that name still tugged at me. Did I ever read his books?

Of course I did. I’m embarrassed to admit that. I didn’t make the connection until I did an Internet search. He wrote the Discworld series, a satirical set of stories that ties together dragons, witches, politicians, gods, cats and centaurs that live in a flat world. During high school, I dove into book series like this as well as the Myth series by Robert Aspirin and the Xanth series by Piers Anthony.

The Color of Magic was Discworld Book 1, a tale about our hero wizard, Rincewind, who travels from his home city of Ankh-Morpork to the edge of the Disc, a journey that is actually a chess game played by gods. Suddenly nostalgic, wanting to feel a part of it all and properly mourn the death of a fine writer, I searched my stash for his book.

My bookshelf boasts blank journals and an eclectic combination of my read-or-to-be-read-again books. Many of my sentimental favorites are in boxes in the basement, callously but deliberately misplaced from my reach, so I wasn’t sure I’d find anything upstairs, but that was the easiest place to start. I was surprised when I saw right there on the second shelf, third book down on the overflow sideways stack, was the book Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett.

This wasn’t the first book in the series, yet I know I bought this one for a reason. Why?

Two things caught my attention. One, the front cover blurb reads, “It’s no vacation when Death takes a holiday.” That’s what must have caught my eye because cover art does nothing for me. This version showed the Grim Reaper with scythe inside a snow globe. Charming, I suppose, but titles and taglines grab my valuable reading attention.

The second thing was the back cover. The price tag was from Borders, a bookstore chain that died almost exactly 4 years ago. Based on the book’s placement on my bookshelf, I must have bought it from the custom-built-from-scratch store that opened 8 months after I moved to Michigan. This new store was less than 3 miles from my house, freshly built for me I liked to think, but that store became the default hangout spot for my husband and me. I wandered the aisles and often took a magazine or my journal to the upstairs café before he joined me.

The store chain closed in July 2011, displacing us shortly after I became Foursquare Mayor of that location, and an appliance store snuck into those walls.

This one book brought back so many memories. It was Death in so many forms.

In December 2014, I committed one New Year’s non-Resolution to revisit an old favorite book. At the time, I had one particular book in mind, using this as an excuse to read that book for the third or fourth time. But now I think this is the one to revive and explore. Who knows? Maybe I’ll write a review about it to remember reading it this time.

I Do Not Believe…

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This is an opinion piece. It expresses my opinion and only my opinion. I hope, after you read this, you will agree with me. I understand that you may not. Either way, I look forward to reading your comments in the Comments Section at the end. – Claire Murray

“I Do Not Believe…”

At a private dinner featuring Governor Scott Walker, Rudy Giuliani said, “I do not believe, and I know this is a horrible thing to say, but I do not believe that the president loves America. He doesn’t love you. And he doesn’t love me. He wasn’t brought up the way you were brought up and I was brought up through love of this country.” (Darren Samuelsohn, Politico)

What does Rudy mean? What is he trying to say? This is my opinion of what he means when he says these things:

If President Obama doesn’t love America and he wasn’t brought up the way we were brought up, what is the message?

I think the message is code for President Obama is not like us. He’s not a true American like we are. In other words, he’s not white. And, if you’re not white, you can’t be patriotic and love America. Everyone in the United States today knows that only white people are patriotic and love America. It comes with the skin color.

When I first heard Rudy’s comment, I started thinking about the future, say 35 years from now. That’s not so far away. According to current predictions (CNN), by 2050 the majority of American citizens will be Afro-Americans, Hispanics, Asians and other people of color. They’ll have the tan skin that we white people lay out in the sun for hours trying to acquire.

If all these people don’t love America because they’re not like us, how is the U.S. going to survive?

Maybe the problem is, Rudy doesn’t know what it means to be patriotic and love America. Maybe he wasn’t as lucky as I. He didn’t learn about patriotism and how to love America in school.

I learned about it a long time ago when I was a child. It meant starting each school day pledging allegiance to the flag and singing the Star- Spangled Banner. It meant learning American history, especially about the early heroes and founders of our country, people like George Washington, James Madison and Crispus Attucks.

I don’t think Rudy learned about Crispus. He was the first man shot and killed in the Boston Massacre. This was the first battle in the Revolutionary War. Crispus was black. Giving his life for his country, for people like you and me, and even Rudy, I feel, makes him very patriotic. He loved America before there was a country to love.

So, Rudy, maybe you want to rethink things. All people can be patriotic and love America if they choose to. Skin color doesn’t make you patriotic. Your actions do.

Your comments?

Additional References:

US Census Bureau

December 12, 2012: https://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/population/cb12-243.html

March 2015: https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2015/demo/p25-1143.pdf

Deadwood Writers Voices

Exploring writing with & for writers and readers.