Ten months after my brother’s death, a cross appeared in the distance. As I drove on a highway, coming from home to see family, the cross became larger and clearer. It wasn’t that I was unfamiliar with this way, and it was not that a clearing suddenly opened. My eyes saw a known landscape, but they roamed further than roadside, as I was a passenger in my vehicle. My sight found something that had always been there. Why hadn't I noticed it before? This lifelike image drew me, and I felt at peace. I exclaimed to my husband that we needed to go to the cross. As we moved closer, my prayers began to flow freely, and His peace grew stronger upon me. This beautiful cross sat in front of a cemetery and a chapel. Can you anticipate my next move? Yes, of course, I took a picture! It was September 24, 2010, well before I had a smartphone and flip telephones were …show more content…
However, I could have never known the changes in the years ahead to put this place in front and center of my life. Three years later, I would visit this place for a different reason, but unbeknownst to me, I was not the only family member to frequent here. My parents had often visited since a great aunt and uncle were buried in 1999, as I found out after a winter’s night when my father passed away. My mother picked their spot in a mausoleum saying that she was sure this was where my dad wanted to be. Having no knowledge of the early family connection to this place, peace again wrapped around me at one of the most painful times of my life. Where my mother sat on that day was even more of connection than anyone would have imagined, including me. Sitting on a white wicker chair, my mother signed the paperwork for internment, but when she stood, I noticed a pillow that was identical to a set that had once adorned my front porch. With each visit, this unexplainable peace revisited
The funeral was supposed to be a family affair. She had not wanted to invite so many people, most of them strangers to her, to be there at the moment she said goodbye. Yet, she was not the only person who had a right to his last moments above the earth, it seemed. Everyone, from the family who knew nothing of the anguish he had suffered in his last years, to the colleagues who saw him every day but hadn’t actually seen him, to the long-lost friends and passing acquaintances who were surprised to find that he was married, let alone dead, wanted to have a last chance to gaze upon him in his open coffin and say goodbye.
Without the assistance of generous community members, the cemetery would not have been possible. “Pap” Taylor, a longtime citizen, gave the first acre of land, which inspired another outstanding citizen, namely “Uncle Bob” Wilson, to donate a second acre of land for burial p...
Harth, Erica. Last Witnesses: Reflections on the Wartime Internment of Japanese Americans. New York: Palgrave for St. Martin's, 2001. Print.
First, the crosses are a representation of Man’s evil and God’s mercy. When guest arrive at my museum, there would be a “Wall of Thought.” On this wall are paintings with hidden crosses in them from different painters. Each painting would have a random person’s belief in what the interpretation of what the cross means to them.
Nagata, Donna, K. "Expanding the Internment Narrative: Multiple Layers of Japanese American Women's Experience." Women's Untold Stories: Breaking Silence, Talking Back, Voicing Complexity. Ed. Mary Romero and Abigail J. Stewart. New York: Routledge, 1999. 71- 82.
The cemetery is believed to be a reflection of life, symbolic of social structures or a replica of a living community. The sense of community in burial practices varies depending on inscriptions or markers, which experienced changes from the movement to industrial from to romantic era (Collier 729). Memorialization provides an insight to cultural trends, cultural pluralism in war memorials, and individual identification, by way of change in symbols over time. Collier finds that history is not relatable to individuals today, for the two perspectives regarding funerary art divide between postmodern with extreme change and one that prevails all eras. She suggests that, “the lack of cultural traditional guidelines leaves some individuals isolated and alienated” however, this notion holds a bias towards institutional funerary practices (Collier 730).
I can’t begin to express how hard it is for me to stand here before you and give my last respects to my loving mother - name here. From the biography that was handed out you can recall that during the her early years in the united states she studied and worked in New York where she met and married my dad, the love of her life. They spent the rest of their days loyal and in love with one another. Unfortunately, one day my father passed away with cancer at a young age. My dad was the one who suffered the most, but my mom suffered right along with him. She felt powerless, and for my mom- powerlessness turned in to guilt and grief, a painful distress she lived with on a daily basis for the next six years. When he died part of her died! Life for her was never the same again. I was not able to completely understand her loss- until now…
Japanese Americans underwent different experiences during the Second World War, resulting in a series of changes in the lives of families. One such experience is their relocation into camps. Wakatsuki’s farewell to Manzanar gives an account of the experiences of the Wakatsuki family before, during and after the internment of the Japanese Americans. It is a true story of how the internment affected the Wakatsuki family as narrated by Jeanne Wakatsuki. The internment of the Japanese was their relocation into camps after Pearl Harbor was bombed by the naval forces of Japan in 1941. The step was taken on the assumption that it aimed at improving national security. This paper looks at how internment impacted heavily on Papa’s financial status, emotional condition and authority thus revealing how internment had an overall effect on typical Japanese American families.
I have been very fortunate to have known my maternal and paternal grandparents and great-grandparents. We enjoy a close family and always have. Sadly, my first experience with a close death was when my paternal grandma died at the age of sixty-four of colon cancer. I was in the ninth grade when she died and hers’ was the first wake and funeral I had experienced. I remember having nightmares for weeks after the funeral. As I grew older, I lost my
I came from a decent sized city in Texas named Weslaco. I have lived in a loving divorced family since I was 5 years old. My brother and I were given joint custody so we have lived with both our parents despite the divorce.
I was raised in rural wyoming where hunting was not only tradition, but a way of life. Since I could walk I had been accompanying my dad on all varieties of hunts. My father did all that was possible to pass on the knowledge and lessons needed for me to become a responsible hunter and man. However, there are some lessons that can only be learned through personal experience. They are often the ones of moral and ethical decisions. My sophomore year of high school I committed the hunting mistake most outstanding in my mind.
I can divide life into two parts: The part before I went to the temple and the part afterwards. I suppose everyone could do that. On September 19, 1998, I went to the temple for my own endowments. I read my journal entry from that time and it did not do justice to what I actually experienced at the temple. I went through so many emotions and had so many questions answered that I had kept to myself.
Having an immense amount of weight on my back while I was trying to get to my new home wasn’t a very good motivation. In fact, I wanted to drop my pack and die every three steps. It didn’t matter how long I had been at Second Nature and how much I had become fond of the place, I hated hiking with crippling weight. The reality of the situation, however, was that we simply could not stop. No matter how much it hurt, we had to keep moving, or else we wouldn’t make it to camp where there would be a source of water. It wasn’t just the hiking that was hard either. Everything I did out there was back breaking and there were so many moments that I just wanted to give up again and again. Yet, I never did.
Excited. Nervous. Determined. Those three words perfectly describe how I was feeling my first day of college. The enrollment process was rigorous for me, but with the encouragement and support from my boyfriend, I was able to finish submitting the required paperwork by the school's deadline. After all of that was over with, I could finally begin a whole new chapter of my life that I had never visioned for myself. None of my family members have attended college, I was going to be the first one. This means, I was showing up for my first class completely mentally unprepared. I was unaware of what to expect for my first semester at Ocean County College.
Loading up the diving equipment, reaching the summit of that mountain, jumping out of planes, sailing to other islands and visiting third world countries. Slowing oneself down, and asking what decision have I made to do with myself if the adventure did not go as planned? I proceeded with an explanation on how cemeteries are more of a landfill than a peaceful place for myself with my family. Having their understanding meant the world to me. I explained that [THESIS] Bio urns are a great way to reduce pollution from coffins [THESIS]. Also known as the green burial movement. After all the talk they began to change their minds on how they wanted to be laid to rest.