Today, like most days, I was driving from one customer to another ..... figuring out how to sell another load of feed when the cell phone rang. Now cell phones in rural Kansas are barely a step above smoke signals on a windy day ... so if it DOES ring you stop as soon as possible or you loose the signal.
As it so happened, the nearest stop to get off the highway happened to be the driveway of an old country cemetery. Well after the call was over, curiosity got the best of me so I stepped from the car and began to look through the headstones at dates and names. Being somewhat of a history buff .. I enjoy visualizing what the "era" would have been like for the person that is eternally resting under the headstone.
There weren't a whole lot of headstones in this .... almost forgotten country graveyard ... but a few were large and sculptured ... some just more or less markers of the grave. Some were affectingly marked as "Mother" or "Father" ... a few said "infant son/daughter of ...." The headstones told little of the persons life, primarily only the date of birth and death .... that is except for "George Pruitt".
Now I never knew George Pruitt ... according to the date on his headstone, he died some 30+ years before I was even born. But I wish I had known him, for on his tombstone was written ..
George Pruitt
1853 - 1919
As a neighbor ... commendable
As a friend ... trustworthy
As a father ... honorable
As a husband ... admirable
What more could any man wish to be said of his life.
Dennis
8 comments:
Debbie would say that kind of a man is a fantasy. Most tributes for a man would read something like:
"Here lies good old Frank, the late husband of Ruth. She asked him how her new dress looked, he told her the truth."
Is it sad that I don't want my tombstone to read " Kelly was forgotten at the blue crab in WT and when she died her staff still hated her, rather passionately." Seriously I want my tombstone to read "Kelly lived a life of grace b/c she was shown so much." at the end of the day - that's what I want my legacy to be.
If KellyGirl remains in WT long enough, I'm "agonna" meet that young lady!! She's a treasure.
Cowboy, this post sounds just like my son-in-law in SEMINOLE, Texas...(yes, Kelly, right next door to you!) I'm "agonna" send this post to him. He's not a blogger...just a "lurker"!
Have a good day!
I LOVE that. Thanks for sharing!
Cemeteries used to creep me out, but now I think they're interesting because of the memorial to personal histories and lives lived. I especially love finding headstones like George Pruitt's.
I am not sure what I want written about me when I am not here. I know that no one escapes with money, power or life in the end.
I am sure that much will be said and some will be printable. Oh well
MUD
George Pruit sounds like a man You could shoot craps with over the phone & thats what I would like for my epitaph .
Only thing missing is... enviable.
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