sqook

This weekend I found myself taking a long walk through nightfall, and wound up in the cemetary. There is one particular headstone on the far corner of the graveyard nearest the road which caught my attention as I passed by.... on the corner of the finished marble sat a little dimly-lit plastic heart. About six inches in diameter, a small battery powered its red, Reno lights to create a dull plastic glow.

Although the sheer tackyness of such an ornament alone made the visit worthwhile, there was something disturbingly familiar about this heart. On a similar journey I made around this last thanksgivingtime, I ran across the very same heart.... when I encountered it then, its lights had nearly died, and it seemed as though the trinket had reached the end of its days. How very appropriate that it, too, should end up in a cemetary.

But when I saw it this time, it had been given life anew. Someone had come, changed the batteries, and revitalized the little shrine. Someone, who probably made this journey every few weeks or so, just to keep this little fire alive.

I wonder what it's like to be thought of when you're dead.