Speaking of Cemeteries...Weren't We? - Nez

 

Growing up in the 1940s and 1950s several of our Lyman neighbors were in their retirement ages. Avery and Maggie Bryson, Nate and Bicie Watson, Pop and Mrs. Davis, Eula and Ruth Aiken, and my great-grandparents J.G. and Mary Buckner were all enjoying their “golden” years. And, eventually, some of them passed away. It was hard as a young child to really understand what was happening, to understand death. Especially since no one explained it. I wasn’t devastated or sad when any of them died. I think the death of Grandpa Buckner, my great-grandfather, was the first time I got it, when I began to understand.

We attended Sunday school and church, and we knew that people from church had died, but I think the way we processed it was that they just stopped coming to church. Of course, I knew that Mr. Self, Mrs. Price, both Mr. and Mrs. Buchanan, and Mr. Bryson had “died”, but I didn’t really know what that meant. And I actually knew Mr. Bryson, he was our next door neighbor. The others were simply church people to me. As young kids we weren’t permitted to attend any of the funerals or burials. And most of them were buried in Lyman Cemetery, just a block away.

I was barely six years old when Grandpa Buckner died. Mom and Dad were divorcing at the time and we lived with our great-grandparents. His death is how I learned what death really meant. It wasn’t explained to me though. He died on December 29, 1949. My sister, brother and I had been sent to our other grandparents in Seattle a few days earlier. We knew Grandpa was sick and in the hospital. But we didn’t know he was dying. We didn’t know that he wasn’t going to get better and come home. We were kept in Seattle until after the funeral. After we got back home nothing was said or explained to us. It took a couple of days for us to learn that he wouldn’t be coming back home but there was no mention of his having died. And we missed him. That Spring Mom took us to the cemetery to his grave and we learned that he was buried there in the ground. I thought that was horrible. It made me so sad I cried. And I didn’t get to tell him “good-bye”.

We were constantly in Lyman Cemetery as kids. It’s contiguous to the city park with no fence between them. We kids took a shortcut through the cemetery to school. It had a gate and path so we wouldn’t walk on graves and we even played in it, usually disregarding the graves. It had/has several prominent tombstones we hid behind to scare girls on their way to school. We also used it for cowboys and Indians, other games and even snowball fights.

As a kid I had several pets at different times. I never had good luck with them. We had a couple outdoor cats. But my first pet was Blacky, a black cocker spaniel puppy that I got from Pop Davis. I was eight or nine. We didn’t have any leash laws in Lyman and dogs pretty much ran free but always came back home. I had him for about a year and a half.  A neighbor out near the highway killed Blacky by poisoning  him. A year later I got a real cute female Beagle puppy and named her Trixie. After she had her first litter of six, I gave four away but I wanted to keep two of them. Mom declared we could not keep three dogs, so one would have to go. When the puppies were about three months old I decided to give Trixie away. I put notices in all over town in stores, the post office, churches, schools and tavern. I talked with everyone but couldn’t find anyone who would take another dog. I told Mom it looked like we were keeping three, and she declared that if I didn’t get rid of at least one she would get rid of them all. She said if nobody would take one, then I would have to terminate one. Days later, I ended up tying Trixie to a tree in the woods to shoot her. I was a really good shot, but after eight shots at her and not coming close I took her back home and told Mom I couldn’t do it. Two days later my Dad showed up and said, ” get your gun and dog and let’s go.” He seemed a little perturbed at me. We went to the dump where I tied her up again. Dad told me to shoot her. When I told him I couldn’t he took my gun and shot her, in one shot, and told me to go remove her collar and with tears in my eyes I did so, while promising myself that I would never own another dog. When I asked if we could bury her Dad picked her up and tossed her over the edge of the dump. That only hardened my promise to myself. I told Dad to take the two puppies with him. I didn’t want them anymore. He did. The next time I went to his place I was surprised to see the two puppies were there but I wouldn’t play with them. His new wife said she wouldn’t let him get rid of them and said if I wanted one or both I could have them. I told her “no thanks”  so she said she would keep them for herself. I was okay with that.

When our kids wanted pets we went to the pound and let them each pick out their choice. Our son picked out a year-old Border Collie and named her Pepper. Our daughter picked out a Chow-African Ridgeback mix puppy with huge paws, which she named Snickers. Snickers grew to about eighty-five pounds. At thirty-five pounds Pepper was in charge. They were really close. Both dogs eventually became Judy’s. Then at seven years old Snickers became ill and the vet diagnosed her with diabetes, and said,” bring her back tomorrow and we’ll have insulin for her.” She died at home that night. Judy was crushed. Pepper was despondent for some time but mostly recovered. Then Pepper was Judy’s only dog. We had her for a total of eighteen years before she was humanely euthanized. Pepper was Judy’s dog but she became adopted me against my will, but I have resisted doing so with others. I don’t know that I ever will. They are buried in a pet cemetery outside of Bowie, Texas.

I’m not comfortable at pet cemeteries. I find them creepy. We visited a couple before deciding on one. Playing in our cemetery as a kid I don’t mind visiting deceased loved ones, but I’m not keen to attend a burial. I know that I will do so again at some point, maybe my own, but I’m certainly not looking forward to it.