Aunt Bill Rambles — Cemeteries

Since the month of May is Decoration Time here on the mountain, I thought I’d tell you’ens how hit used to be.  Now fer you folks what don’t know about Decoration Day — hit’s when kinfolks and friends meet at the cemetery, on a certain Sunday, where their folks is buried and decorate the graves.

The first Sunday decoration is at Fairview, second Sunday hit’s at Skirum, Crossville and New Harmony.  I’ve mentioned just a few, but there are lots of others.  Folks don’t attend lack they used to.  Billie quit going many years ago when somebody said to her, “Law, Billie Mae, how fleshy you are.”  That made her so mad — she said she know’d how fat she wuz and didn’t need nobody reminding her.  Now she takes a bouquet from the yard to Skirum to her mother’s and little sister’s graves, but she goes rail early.  Her daddy is buried by his first wife and that decoration is the Saturday before the third Sunday and he’s buried in a different cemetery.

Anyway some time in April kinfolks would meet at the cemetery to clean off the graves.  They wodn’t no grass on the graves back then. People would take a hoe and scrap ever bit of the grass off, rake hit up and tote hit off and then they’d sweep a big spot around their family graves with a brush broom.  When they’d git through doing all this them graves looked nice and they didn’t want nobody walking on the fresh swept part.  Some times folks would put white gravel on the grave – if they had a little cement wall around the edge.

Billie ain’t never put artificial flowers on her mother’s grave because she said before she died that if that’s all they had to put on — jest leave flowers off. She might lack artificial flowers we’ve got today. Of course, back then lots of folks made the flowers out’n crepe paper and put the blossom a wire and stuck that wire in the ground on top of the grave.   Now if’n hit rained, that crepe paper would fade and the ground under hit would be red, blue or whatever color the flower wuz.  And lots of Sundays of decoration hit would rain.  And I’ve see’d hit so cold you’d haf to wear a coat over yore new dress.

Jest in case you’re aiming to clean the cemetery and need to clean the tombstones I’m a-goin’ to give you a recipe to use.  John tried to clean his kinfolks stones one time, but this wadn’t strong enough to do the job.  So you try hit at yore own risk.  This is how hit is with Sand Mountain country living.

RECIPE FOR CLEANINHG OLD MONUMENTS
1 gallon water                        1/2 box of baking soda
1 Tbsp. white vinegar           1/2 box  Ajax

If marble is badly stained, try adding 1 1/2 cups of ammonia to a gallon of water and rinse well.  Use finest grade of sandpaper on the monument first and then apply mixture with stiff brush or steel wool.