Going Home

Layer by layer, the years are lifted away. Each transparent page, when lifted, reveals a deeper meaning. This trip to Virginia with mama to spend time with her sister, the aunt for whom I am named, is a journey through time and grief and gladness.

Yesterday we visited Hollywood, the old cemetery in Richmond where my great-grandparents, great-aunts and great-uncles are buried in the Fritzsche family plot. This is no Johnny come lately cemetery with rows of level graves laid out in military precision  adorned with sterile silk flowers. It follows the rolling hills up to the bluff that overlooks the James River. Roses, flowering shrubs, pansies, geraniums, and hanging baskets light up the surroundings with scent and color. A large sign proclaims silk flowers are not allowed. Many of the gravestones are accompanied by beautiful sculptures of faithful canine companions and wherever you look, there are stone angels. This silent city contains the graves of Civil War dead along with those who came before and after, loved ones forgotten and remembered gathered together in this one beautiful spot.

Last night at Aunt Peg’s house, I found myself sitting on the couch sandwiched between Ken and Eddie, my two cousins. Once there were four of us grandchildren at Cloverly, troubadors in time gone by who spent summers gilded with gladness at our own Camelot, a farmhouse in King and Queen County in Virginia. I feel my sister’s absence more keenly here than anywhere else and tears lie just beneath the surface, sometimes overflowing when I least expect it. Life has not turned out as we imagined it long ago in those sweet days. The hole left in the space once filled by my sister is now filled with joy and grief in equal measure.

Sunday morning we go to worship at Bruington Baptist Church where my grandparents lived out their life of faith, where my mother grew up and was baptized, and we will hear stories of Aunt Thelma, Uncle Bill, Grandma and Granddaddy, Little Grandma and Big Grandma, all buried in the churchyard with generations of other families whose roots run deep in the swampy Tidewater soil. This dirt is under the fingernails of my soul and it calls to me... you are home... much as my beloved North Carolina mountains do.

Mama and Aunt Peg wear red rose corsages given to them by my husband Michael, an old Mother’s Day tradition. I watch Aunt Peg, 94 years old, stoop to rearrange the flowers on her parents graves. And then the two old sisters walk into the 1831 church building that is so full of memories... the voices of children, parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles, friends and pastors swirl in the mist of time contained by the old red brick sanctuary. Cousin Lillian Walker plays the prelude and worship begins. Angel wings enfold us as we sit in the straight back pews and I am home.

I am grateful for these two old women, my living links to my “begats list”, who even now continue to tell the stories of homeplace and family. When it is my turn, I want to tell the stories of family and faith and amazing graces with the same sense of wonder and joy and particularity. Perhaps it is my turn even now? For all the stories of faith and family, I give thanks. For the all the laughter and tears, grace and goodness, for family even third cousins once removed, for the Virginia Tidewater dirt where my roots run deep, I sing a song of thanksgiving. For the God who has given me a home in this world and promises me a new home yet to come, I am overflowing with gratitude.  “Come thou fount of every blessing, tune my heart to sing with thee...”