Happy Memorial Day!

by Kerry Blair

Thanks to Jeff for lending me his day when I missed my own, and apologies to all the rest of you for the disappointment of finding me here, now. I know just how you feel. Jeff’s blog is the highlight of my Mondays as well. Never fear: he will be back next week and in the meantime you will find his Farworld blog HERE. (And, yes, you may all be excused now.)

I asked to blog today because Memorial Day is possibly my favorite holiday. Truly. Not only am I descended from a long line of patriots and veterans of war, but I’ve always had a thing for dead people.

The final clause of that last sentence is not quite as macabre as it sounds. (Almost, but not quite.) When I was a child, my favorite picture book was an album of family daguerreotypes, several of which had been taken after the subjects’ deaths. No, my maiden name is neither Addams nor Kevorkian; calling in a photographer when a loved one passed was not uncommon in America in the late 1800s. Nor was it uncommon a few generations later to decorate ancestral graves on Memorial Day, and then have a picnic at the site. At any rate, I grew up fascinated by old photos and older cemeteries. These days the pictures are framed and displayed, and I am not only faithful about keeping up the graves of loved ones in the area, but am inclined to drive a hundred miles out of the way to visit a great-grandmother’s final resting place and/or drag my family to the oldest plots in practically any city we happen to visit in order to pay my respects to total strangers.

As I said, I have a deep and abiding appreciation for dead people. It has little to do with the fact that they’re dead. It has everything to do with the fact that they lived. Loved. Did all the things that we do – and more. At some point they passed on their life and love (and green eyes and square faces and clefted chins) before moving on as we all must. Since my children were very small I have tried to impress upon them that “Families Can be Together Forever” is more than a Primary song. It is an eternal truth older than the world on which we live. Because of our Savior, the people who stare down at us from the mantel still live. They still love. And I suspect they are as mindful of us as we are of them, probably more so. Putting flowers on their graves is a meaningful custom, but honoring them in our hearts, and being grateful for the sacrifices they made, should be something we do 365 days a year, not just one.

And, of course, being who we are and knowing what we know, we should do more than that.

I suspect I feel more strongly about genealogy (and dead people) than most because of a dream I had when I was ten or twelve. I wasn’t yet a member of the Church, so while its meaning could not have been clearer, its message didn’t strike me until years later.

In the dream I was seated in a bright and beautiful room, surrounded by women I felt I had always known and always loved. The bonds between us were stronger even than sisterhood. These women weren’t just dear to me, they were part of me. I felt that I had always been with them. I wanted to continue to be with them forever.

Very soon a stranger entered and told us that we were soon to be separated. We must live other lives in another place. She then began to describe the places we might go and bits and pieces of the lives we might live. Though I sense I saw many lives, I only remember a few. First, she described a sparse existence of bitter cold and gnawing hunger. While I shrank away, one of my beloved sisters raised her arm and said, “I will go. Send me.”

Another glimpse included a miserable voyage across a vast sea into a wilderness so strange and terrifying it made me shudder. “I will go,” said another of my sisters.

More life-experiences were described. Many were the scenes of deprivation, struggle, and heartache. I remember vividly the stranger asking for someone to bear fourteen children, with the knowledge that only two would live to adulthood. This time no one stirred. Then a very small, very gentle hand went up. “I will go. Send me.”

I was almost the only one uncommitted when the stranger told of the first life into which the gospel of Jesus Christ might come. There were many, many blessings . . . and one charge: to never forget. Here, at last, was the opportunity to somehow find and bind all the courageous, giving, and truly good women who went before . . . to restore our circle, this time forever.

“Me,” I said finally. “Please.”

And thus it was. When people are surprised to hear that I took the lessons, read the Book of Mormon, and was baptized in less than a week, it is because I’ve so rarely shared this vivid dream. (Almost never, in fact. I don’t know why the Spirit moved me so strongly this morning.) But the moment the missionaries mentioned earthly sealings done with heavenly keys I recognized my life’s mission. The rest, I figured, must be true because that so assuredly was. (The rest is true, I’m thrilled to report after years of study and application.)

And so Memorial Day has for me the meaning of Thanksgiving, the awe of Christmas, and the promise of Easter – along with the joy of every other holiday and birthday we observe – all wrapped up in one. I decorate graves. I honor the men and women who gave – and give – their lives for our country. Like most of America, I gather as much family as I can for a cookout. In the evening I take down the pictures and get out the books of “dead people” and I remember. In fact, I memorialize. My children know all faces and all the stories of the men and women who sacrificed and struggled and endured for love of us. Thus they better understand why they look as they do and believe as they choose. Each one of them has, in gratitude and faith, accepted the gift of life and given the gift of eternal life – as only the living are now able in the fonts of the Houses of our Lord. Because of His gift there are no dead people to remember. There are only people beloved by someone somewhere who have come and gone and now wait for a glorious reunion.

What a happy and memorable day that will be.