LIFE LESSONS

Our Spiritual Secret Weapon? The Cemetery.

Finding peace and contentment amongst the dead

Cue the Danny Elfman music?

Bring out Beetlejuice, Jack Skellington and everything Tim Burton?

Not quite.

While I can appreciate a foggy, atmospheric cemetery that would make Dracula and the Wolfman proud — replete with gargoyles, crosses, weeping angels and dramatic headstones — it’s within the Central Park-like atmosphere of Forest Lawn in Burbank, California that I have found deep moments of reflection, spirituality and peace.

My partner Eddie and I cycled by the place endless times on our long-distance bike journeys, always appreciating the green space. But I had simultaneously mixed feelings about this type of cemetery.

Where were the tombstones of varied heights, some leaning this way or that? Where were the tiers of granite? To the uninitiated, this looked more like a generic city park, perhaps a Disney-fied version of a cemetery. Most grave markers are flat to the ground, with a look more to aesthetics than memorialization.

Most wouldn’t be caught dead in a cemetery — did you see what I did there? (Deep dad-joke bow).

It’s not like my partner and I are gothic emo guys. We’re more from the have-folding-chairs, will-travel set — and so eventually when the coffeeshops were too crowded or lost their charm, our gaze turned to the enormous, perfectly perched green spaces around Los Angeles, and whoa, they were cemeteries.

It’s not that we’re fixated on death. Quite the opposite — all those headstones make us fascinated by life — by the lives of say one Philip Quintley, one Mildred Vaux, or even young Sally Bornoski. What were their dreams? Did they figure out the secret to life? Were they jolly and happy or constantly bitter?

Pro Tip — if you’re a writer of plays, short stories or fiction, a walk through any cemetery will introduce you to a whole plethora of unique first or last names from different eras that you’ve never considered — a great way to find that perfect name for your secondary characters. A cemetery in France, Belize or Italy? Even better.

A cemetery is that level playing field, that reminder, no matter what city or country you’re visiting. You can be the gal who hasn’t stepped foot in a church in decades, the guy who thinks everything woo-woo and religious is for the birds, but there is something spiritual — and grounding — about gazing at those grave markers. Reading the dates, doing the math. And realizing all of the worries these people used to have, now silenced.

You can imagine the wives waiting at home during World War I or World War II, with no access to Zoom, texts, emails, long-distance — nothing, no contact — and somehow making it through life.

This guy over here was overly fixated on the flirt at the office, to the detriment of his marriage. This woman never had a month go by without worrying about where the rent money was coming from. This fella worked three jobs to put his kids through college in the 1960s.

And this little baby never made it past day five.

So many had dreams, had stresses, thought the entire world revolved around their every decision, their every relationship squandered, their every promotion missed.

And they’re all here, in the ground anyway.

I’m not trying to be bleak — it can just bring peace and help center you when overly worked up about some injustice or indignity. Your problems aren’t anything new under the sun. Eighty percent of the folks residing here now had the same emotional and physical struggles. Maybe worse — handicapped in a world before ramps and wider bathroom stalls. And it can help us reclaim our now, and to be back into this moment right here.

The meandering deer stroll through, searching for flower treasures, enjoying this wide open space free of guns and hunters.

But it was during Covid that these cemetery visits saved us.

As we pondered rising infection rates, an overcrowded city and our first global pandemic, the cemetery again became our sanctuary and respite, a spiritual place to escape the indoors, be socially distant, and take in the amazing-for-Los Angeles white puffy clouds against a sapphire sky.

The cry of ambulances coming into nearby St. Joseph’s Hospital floated with the wind, and “normal life” continued nearby as families gathered for burials at fresh graves. Were they Covid victims? Or simply natural causes during a globally complicated time.

Don’t worry, we went to the beach and the forests too. But the cemetery was an easy nearby journey to peace.

Feeling bitchy? The cemetery can also bring that schadenfreude ecstasy in realizing that even that vile politician, that disgusting dictator, that vindictive businesswoman… will indeed leave this earth. And someday, literally, young people will ask, “Who was that?” They will have been forgotten.

During one of our exits from Forest Lawn, we came upon the burial site of Ms. Bette Davis and family. One of the biggest global box office superstars, resting here, deteriorating here, overlooking the Warner Bros Studio lot that made her famous.

Bette Davis, who’s that?, the young girl asked as we left.

Elizabeth Taylor, who’s that?

Paul Newman, who’s that?

Mary Tyler Moore, who’s that?

Someday, Beyonce, who’s that?

Oh life. A nice reminder —

Live life for you and for the people you love — someday people won’t know you even existed.

That is, unless my partner and I happen to be at your cemetery, pondering your varied, beautiful and well-lived life. Emotional globetrotters are we.

Thanks to Jillian Amatt - Artistic Voyages and B.R.Shenoy for the inspirational writings on tombs and cemeteries in Buenos Aires and across the globe. You helped me realize I’m not the only one pondering life’s mysteries.

Other pieces by this author you might enjoy: