On Sunday after church I walked home through the graveyard in Heinola, the small town where my mum’s relatives live. This is actually far from morbid, as it is beautiful and serene there. The sunlight plays through the leaves of birch trees, casting moving shadows on the dirt walkways and old gravestones. Merry splashes of colored flowers dot the markers, and green watering cans hang next to spigots for the caretakers’ ease.
When we were little, my sister and I would wander through the rows of graves and read the names, picking out ones we liked, laughing at the ones that sounded old-fashioned or meant something entirely different in another language. We found Russian names, Swedish names, and Finnish names. She’s actually already reserved the name Alina, in case she has a girl one day, so I can’t use that one! I tried to remember which one I had picked out, but as I wandered down the path lined with names like Yrjö, Aino, Kaarle, Eemil, Alexanteri, Helmi and Hellä, nothing struck me as familiar. I do recall once, that in a graveyard on the border between Finland and Norway, I found the Saami (Lapplander) name Jouni Aslak, and quite fancied it; perhaps not enough to actually name my kid that though!
There is one grave at the cemetery that sticks in my mind, even more than those of my great-grandparents that I never met (but for in black and white pictures inside an old red family album). There is a small iron cross nestled at the foot of two tall pine trees near one of the entrances. Maria Wilhelmina Franberg, born in May of 1878, died in October of 1879, it reads in an engraved oval. I have often wondered how this little baby died, to whom she was born, and how it is that there are almost always flowers at her tiny cross. I think children come and place them there, much like my sister and I did once upon a time during our summers visits.
Why I’m telling this, I’m not quite sure. Perhaps it’s because in the midst of a beautiful sunny day I found the little grave oddly touching, and oddly sad, heralding the briefness of life and at the same time the continuity of it; paradoxes juxtaposed like gravemarkers in the midst of blooming flowers. Life. Death. Life.
3 comments:
Did you know my mom's name is Alina? :) Glad you like it.
I once wrote a short story about a boy I knew that died at the age of 7. Still, that's a whole lot more than the little Maria, but the story might have been the same: a little angel was sent to brighten at least one person's life.
Enjoyed your musings and some of those type thoughts come to me when visiting cemetaries. During a visit to my uncle in rural Mississippi, we went to visit several small cemetaries that are around that area. We had some kin in each one and he would tell me how each was related to me - very interesting. My Mom and Dad are buried down there in a somewhat larger burial field - sad to visit but a needful thing none the less. ec
Yes, ec, it is needful to visit places of family history. It is interesting to learn about the people that came before you. You must have a very large family!
Es, yes, I recall that's your mum's name! It's so pretty, you should tell her that for me! :)
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