November/December 2024
My intent is for this to be a positive message to women and to offer them a choice. Specifically, the women the mainstream media ignores. Women, that choose Life. Ironically, the idea led me to visit a gravesite. I barely knew the parents, and as the marker only has one date, obviously never knew the child. So why that grave? It was the first of many I would dig over the years.
My dad was the sexton, and questioned why the excavator wanted his full price for a much smaller grave. At 15, when dad offered me less than half, I quickly loaded a shovel and pick, pushing our wheelbarrow across the road. I had dug holes on our farm; this time I would get paid — $100 was a lot back then.
At the time, I wasn’t thinking about how the parents had chosen life, even a brief one. Not far away is a similar grave. It has two dates but they are not far apart. As then being sexton, I had to deal with the young mother. She had chosen life, even though it was a brief struggle for her child. There is another marker, placed long before I was born. The elderly man who discussed his plans for his future burial nearby, explained she was his mother. Whether she died during or shortly after his birth, I didn’t ask. She chose life — giving him life ended hers.
&nbs ...
