We went to Marshall's grave this morning and placed his head stone from the Army. Cecil, the owner and caretaker of Live Oak Cemetery, was there with his great grandson and showed us where to put it. He said to my dad, "I don't know if you know this, but my wife died on the 20th." She died just 5 days after their 71st anniversary! Cecil is 94 and his wife was 95 when she died last Friday (April 20). Wow. I can't even imagine living 71 years together with the same person. Cecil also had a brother die in Iwo Jima. We saw his wife's grave as we were driving out of the cemetery; it was in the older part next to his brother.
We dug a little hole and placed the head stone in it at the top of the grave. It was quiet. I took some pictures. Mom and Mason said almost nothing. I felt numb. I didn't cry at all. It was too sureal. Is this really happening? We aren't really putting a tomb stone on my brother's grave, are we? His birth and death dates are entirely too close together. October 10, 1986 - November 22, 2006.
Death is all around us. People die. Maybe someday I won't be so stunned at that thought. Cecil's wife died. His brother was killed. It happens to everyone.
So I reflected on all this and concluded that the righteous and the wise and what they do are in God's hands, but no man knows whether love or hate awaits him. All share a common destiny—the righteous and the wicked, the good and the bad, the clean and the unclean, those who offer sacrifices and those who do not. ... Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might, for in the grave, where you are going, there is neither working nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom.
- Ecclesiastes 9:1-2, 10
the existing grave marker
Derek digging the hole
Mason and Derek setting the grave marker in place
Love,
Heidi
