Thoughts after visiting the Cemetery on Memorial Day

It's always good to take a picture of where your relatives are buried. You may not forget, but your children and grandchildren may never go to the cemetery.

Winne is buried near her sister, her mother and her aunt and uncle.

Hartford Reynolds.

Little Minerva Castle, died in 1855. Daughter of Mary Ann and Jeremiah Castle

Memorial Day, 2012 There were no particular celebrations of Memorial Day in our household on Zena Road. Only one memory stands out of a Memorial Day parade we attended in Kingston when I was very young. We were watching the parade from a vantage point on Broadway, near the Kingston City Hall. It was a warm sunny day, and my memory is filled with the smell of gasoline emitting from the large camouflage green trucks pulling artillery guns past us as we stood along the parade route. My best guess is that I was around 5 years old and the memory of the Korean War, still fresh in most adult minds.

Fifteen years would seem like enough time to recover from one’s war experiences. As a survivor of Saipan and Tinian in the south pacific, my father had no desire to celebrate, commemorate or recall his World War II experiences. Perhaps his wish to forget had something to do with our never attending Memorial Day parades or making a big splash with family barbecues on this solemn holiday. Decoration Day, as it was known during WWI, was an important holiday in the Mower family, there fore, I’ve been attending Woodstock Memorial Day parades for thirty eight years. I’ve worked on floats for the Lions club, marched with the Fire Company # 1 Ladies Auxiliary and the Woodstock little league. I even helped design a float for the Auxiliary to commemorate the brave men and women who care for the wounded in battlefield hospitals. The idea for the float came about while musing about those artillery guns I observed in the Kingston parade as a child. The day is filled with visits to the Legion Post 1026 or Woodstock Fire Co. # 1. Each organization plays a huge part in Woodstock’s parade and host hot dogs and soda after the parade. Then, it’s off to a family barbecue! Memorial Day is the traditional day one visits the cemetery where loved ones are laid to rest. Flowers are carefully put at the grave, with the hopes that they will last the season. Granted, this is a tradition of my father’s generation. I have done my best to help him keep up with placing the flowers at the graves of his family at St. Mary’s cemetery in Kingston. Unfortunately, something with my schedule seems to always interfere with helping him, and he manages to put flowers out before the June heat arrives. Now in his 90th year, he’s not so sure he’s going to continue the tradition any more. I, myself, was compelled to wander around the Woodstock Cemetery this Memorial Day, one little marigold plant in hand, to place at the grave of my mom. I took a time out from the Memorial Day services at the Legion Monument and slowly made my way past the Mower’s, the Happy’s and the Wilbers, up the little hill toward the new section of the cemetery.

I walked past the older original burial places and felt like I had been transported into an abandoned cemetery. On Memorial Day’s in the past, the entire Woodstock Cemetery would be mowed and the area around the head stones would be clipped. The Legion always places flags at the grave sites of veterans. As I paused in the shade, I could only shake my head and ponder, my, how so many things have changed.