So this post's a little different. I'm taking a module (as they call it here, course/class as we call it back home) about the history of Leeds. It's actually called Leeds: Voices of the Past, which may be important later. So anyway, this modulecourseclass tries to explain how this area was shaped, from Prehistoric times to the present, by the various peoples who called it home. We've talked about Romans and Celts and Saxons and Normans, discussed how places get their names, and handled animal bones from 8,000 years ago. Wednesday, we took a field trip. To a cemetery.
Now, I know how that sounds. A cemetery? Walking around a graveyard in the rain and mud (because it's England, so of course it was raining) for 2 hours counts as a field trip? Well it turns out yes. I've always kind of like cemeteries (I'm weird) because they make me feel peaceful (weird) and contemplative (weird). But my teacher for this class really encouraged us to pay attention to the headstones and to figure out the stories of the people buried there.
We went to a place called the Beckett Street Cemetery, which as far as British cemeteries go, is a fairly important one. It's the first (probably) municipal burial place in all of England, which basically means you didn't have to be Anglican and rich to get buried there, and more than 180,000 people took advantage. Even in the warm-and-fuzzy public burial though, there's a nice segregation between the Anglican dead and the dissenters (they went with a strict "with us or against us" type of policy), complete with separate chapels and staff. No cross-religion-contamination here. Kind of sad that even in death we can't forgive our differences.
Side note: the cemetery is also pretty much across the street from a giant hospital. That must be a cheery reminder for patients.
Anyway, not the point.
Wait, what was my point? Oh yeah. About me being creepy and liking graveyards. The real reason, I think, is not the peace or the clarity, but the storytelling. Each of the gravestones tells a story when you read between the lines. It may appear to be simply a death date and an epitaph, but the details reveal mysteries and love stories and heartbreak and it's simply beautiful.
Take John Stead for example. Born August 1824, died 1882. Buried with his wife Jane, died 1863. Also buried with his wife Frances, died 1917. A man and both his first and second wife together for eternity. Wife #2 outlived her husband, so that means she oversaw his burial and approved his being married next to #1. And then chose to accompany them. I wonder if Frances and Jane were friends before Jane died. Or perhaps Frances understood that Jane was John's first true love and wanted them to be together.
Elizabeth Incuddrey, Hannah Kilner, and John and Harriet Wilson. A married couple and two elderly women, all different last names, together in an expensive grave. It's true there are common graves in Beckett, where poor strangers are buried together and memorialized on headstones 12 or 15 at a time. This isn't one of those cases. Are those two women spinster sisters of one of the married couple? Then how did they get the different surnames? If they're John/Harriet's widowed sisters, what happened to their husbands? Were Elizabeth and Hannah perhaps clandestine lesbians, with the Wilsons guarding their secret as their closest friends? Were the Wilsons simply generous folk who paid for the burial of their neighbors? Then why are they together with them in the grave?
Henry Fisher, innkeeper, died 1889, age 34. Buried with brother-in-law John Thorp, and his wife Mary. This one was another puzzle. Henry's a business-owner, chooses to be buried with his brother-in-law John. Makes sense so far: probably a business partner, perhaps took over after Henry's death and paid for a lavish burial stone. But wait--"in-law" means relative of wife...where is she? Henry died young, so she possibly remarried, and maybe chose to spend eternity with her new husband. That must be a slap in the face for Henry--tragic early death, but at least you'll be reunited with your wife beyond the grave. Oh, wait, no. Consolidation prize--you get her brother.
John Brindley, died June 5, 1863. John, son of the above, died September 16th, 1863, 4 months old. Isabella, wife, died 1866. Sometimes, the gravestones give us tragedy more powerful than any movie. Isabella suffers the death of her husband only a month after the birth of their son, only to see that son die a mere three months later. With no other children to live for, Isabella herself died three years later, broken-hearted and alone.
Remember I said this class is called "Voices of the Past?" I guess what I mean by all of this is that we don't think often enough about each others' voices. To each others' stories. That our houses and classrooms and streets once held other people, long lost to time. That those graves each represent someone who lived and loved and had hopes and fears. That we, too, will someday be only words etched in gravestones, with future generations trying to read between the lines of our death dates and our epitaphs.
So just listen. Don't forget that everyone you walk past has struggles and love and heartbreak and jealousies and generosities. Don't forget that everyone has a story worth hearing, and that you do, too. And, for goodness sake, don't let anyone tell you that your story isn't important.
But hey, what do I know? I'm just a cemetery-lovin' kid.
xo
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