The key to the garden of stone

Yesterday we took Cletus to the re-dedication of a WWII civilian war memorial. Although Remembrance Sunday is about fallen soldiers, it was good to remember the loss of life locally during the war. From the collection of names on the memorial, some must have been sleeping in their beds or gathered round the dinner table or sheltered together in the space under the stairs when the bombs fell.

This was how they were remembered:

with plastic lettering slipping away.

But the memorial has been redone, with nice bronze plaques and raised lettering and new paving leading up to the memorial. And indeed it looks lovely. So yesterday, the rededication was held and they released doves and everything. We really, really meant to be on time. But we weren’t. You see, the memorial is at one end of the cemetery and although we come from that direction we have to walk down to the middle of this very long graveyard to get to the entrance and then walk all the way back. It’s probably about 2/3ds of a mile and to be honest, we really just didn’t allow enough time. We’re still not factoring in how much time it takes to get a baby ready.

Baby and war memorial

So by the time we got there the doves were gone and the folks were breaking up. But we did get invited to tea and we were given the combination to the nearest gate. Obviously we can’t abuse that, but it saves us a quite a long walk along the busy road.

And I used the combination today to slip easily into the graveyard and funnily enough, the doves were back, just milling around, waiting. Two lovely white peaceful doves.

Last week, I also made my usual trip to the Garden of Remembrance at Westminster Abbey. I noticed that the wreath to Arkansas soldiers wasn’t there, I wondered if the old man who always brought a wreath for the Razorbacks who had treated him so well as a boy during the war was gone or if he just hadn’t made the trip yet. I also noticed the crosses from the DoD (I guess) were the same ones from last year.

It’s now US dead 3860, UK 171 and Other 133

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Here’s what I said about Remembrance Sunday last year and here’s what Kathy has written this year helping us to remember the living and the dead.

If they freed me from this prison

I love cable. I’m watching Johnny Cash singing from the Tennessee State Prison 30 years ago. He’s doing a train song medley. Everybody’s hair looks horribly dated except, oddly enough, for the styles of about 90% of the prisoners.

It wasn’t just Johnny playing. but also Linda Ronstadt and Roy Clark and a comedian called Foster Brooks. Anybody remember Foster Brooks? I don’t. Is that what passed for funny back in the 70s?

Do folks play prisons anymore? Do prisoners have cable now and watch Johnny playing to inmates of three decades ago? (I guess some of those guys are still in prison.)

Wasn’t there a song about a guy who wanted to see Johnny Cash and he got into all kinds of scrapes and so forth and ended up in prison where he got to see Cash. Heh.