on death and life

In my world religions seminary class that wrapped up last week, one of the discussion threads left to the things we do for people when they die....meaning, what we humans do in various cultures that honor the dead. The discussion ran the gamut from traditional Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) celebrations as found in Mexico to rather mainstream American observances, such as visiting graves of loved ones on Memorial Day. The discussion revolved around where the 'line' is (if there is a line!) between commemoration of the dead and ancestral worship.

I've thought a lot about what significance there is to visiting the dead, and what relationships are built between the living and the memory of their dearly departed. My response to the thread follows below:
 

When I was a kid, I have vivid memories of going to the cemetery with my mother to plant flowers and tend to my sister's grave. Carmel, my parent first daughter, died when she was almost two, seven years before I was born. I remember playing the grass near the headstone which had my parents names engraved with my sisters in between the two of them, where she is buried. That burial plot is right next to my Grandparents headstone, my great grandmothers and a great aunt's. (They all bought plots together when Carmel died) So, literally as I child, I spent much time at and tending the grave of my sister and the future graves of most all of the (influential in my life) elders in my family. There are many things that have effected my life from these experiences, most of which we won't get into here. But I will say I still return there to talk to the sister I never knew. When I am broken, or tired, or frustrated, I find myself driving to sit on the grass leaning against the headstone in the only place where I have ever know her. I never really thought of it as a worshiping of my ancestor (although, she isn't really an ancestor, is she) and I'm not sure this will continue when my parents pass along. As I think of that day, it seems to difficult to imagine.

I recognize that this relationship is mostly what I make up in my head, as I never knew her and she never knew me. Yet, there is some solace in visiting her there, the only sibling I'll ever have. Death and the way it affects each of us is fascinating, even if the death occurs years before our existence.

 When I was a student at Graceland while getting my undergraduate degree, I often found myself taking a drive out the the cemetery just on the edge of town to sit on a bench or wander through the headstones, always using it as time to think. Somehow connecting myself to the dead grounds me in a way that I had previously not recognized. This connection to the souls that have passed before, who have lived, and worked, and played, and worshiped in the towns where I have lived give me a sense of history and purpose that I rarely find anywhere else.