Valentine’s Day is round the corner. So much love and chocolate heart-shapes and flowers and smooshy stuff at every turn. However, smooshy stuff is not my thang, y’all. I want to talk about the dark-dancing romance of: death-eath-eath-eath-eath . . . .
The day before I was to turn in Tender Graces, I drove through our Smokies listening to a Celtic group siren out the song of my mountains, and a scene burned into my brain of Virginia Kate riding Fionadala up the mountainside, hair and mane and tail flying—all a blur of upward movement and thundering sound. And in Virginia Kate’s pack lay Momma’s ashes. At the ridgetop she opened the urn, and as she twirled-twirled-twirled, boned ash littered the air and then at last (un)rested on the mountainside, on Virginia Kate, on Fionadala. I quickly added the scene at the oh-so-very last minute as a short dreamy imagery-prologue and sent the final manuscript off to my editor—no regrets.
That’s when I knew I wanted to be cremated. My decision solidified as I ran my hand through my beloved companion dog’s ashes—oh how the lighter specks sparkled in the sunlight, the heavier pieces final-falling to the ground. And then my dear father—I poured a portion of his three million pieces plus two in a favorite place. How his ashes glowed so puri-fired white! It is a reverential experience to release a beloved one’s ashes, later finding dusty remnants in a fingernail, a crevice of the skin, dusted across the hair of an arm. You find it difficult to wash off their essence, until you recognize that it will be one more journey for them, down down down, water finding water finding water to the sea.
Thing is, if you burn yourself to a boned-ash crisp, where’s your tombstone? Who will ever know you were an Earth creature, and know what you were all about? Where is your tangible writer’s legacy? Architects leave behind structures; artists leave behind works of art; actors leave behind movies and television; dead people leave behind tombstones.
If you have no stone marker in a graveyard, how will anyone stroll past your chiseled remains and find curiosity in its inscription? Instead, here lies Kat, and here, and there, there-there-here-there-there-here. How unsettling to me to feel that the very dreams for which I hoped and desired would be forever lost to time.
Then I had an epiphany. Folks, our books are our tombstones, our legacy if you will, and I will, thank you very much. Our published works rise up out of the dirt and tell future generations who we were, what we loved, who we loved. We are pantomimed by our characters. Scorched into the brains of our readers (or so we do hope!).
There is no way to know how long our books will be sold once we die, or for that matter while we are alive, but somewhere, someone will have our words tucked into their bookcase, or in an e-reader, or to be stumbled upon at a garage sale, here, there, here-there-here.
I am not too humble to admit that this gives me joy and comfort. To know something of me will live on. Yes, yes, yes, I understand that I will live on through my son, and my granddaughter, and in the memories my friends and family have of me, through Facebook posts, with photographs. But I wanted the equivalent of a stranger walking through a gravesite and reading my tombstone: “She gave life all she had. And she wrote some pretty danged good books. She was fearless, and a kickass kind of woman. She adored her readers, and they adored her back. She never found true love—she loved her words and language most of all, even when at the sacrifice.”
And with our words, our books, our love, our life, our sacrifice, our joy and our pain, every time a reader turns the page and reads, something of us remains—we do not disappear.
Do you want to leave something of yourself behind that serves as your writer’s legacy, your writer’s tombstone? And what does your tombstone say about you? Or are you content to disappear forever and ever and ever-er-er-er-er-er-er?
About Kathryn Magendie
Kathryn Magendie is an Amazon Kindle Bestselling Author of five novels and a novella, as well as short stories, essays, and poetry —Tender Graces was an Amazon Kindle Number 1 bestseller. She’s a freelance editor of many wonderful author’s books and stories, a sometimes personal trainer, amateur/hobby photographer, and former Publishing Editor of The Rose & Thorn Journal (an online literary journal published with Publishing Editor Poet/Songwriter Angie Ledbetter). Magendie’s stories, essays, poetry, and photography have been published in print and online publications. Born in the beautiful Appalachian Mountains of West Virginia, her family moved her here-there-yonder until her feet were for many years stuck in the murky strange swamps of South Louisiana. Then! One fine morning over twelve years ago, her long-but-not-forgotten dreams came true and she unglued her feet, leaving behind those moss-filled grandfather oak trees, and returned to the mountains to live in a little log house in the Cove at Killian Knob in Maggie Valley, Western North Carolina. Here, she spins tales, edits manuscripts/books and websites, drinks strong dark black coffee, and from her porch over-looking the Great Smoky Mountains contemplates the glow of Old Moon—Cove Crow and his family speak to her and she listens.
The difference between being published, and not having published (and finished, of course) that first book is ENORMOUS.
‘I have written.’ I have spoken. Something that was important to me is ensconced in the pages of an actual printed book, and is available in digital-land as a file.
Even more important to me: people have READ my book. And some of them have said wonderful things. That novel, conceived in silence and solitude, has started to affect how people think: not my words, but the words a reviewer wrote and posted in public.
It is the writer’s form of ‘I have lived.’
I love your question, And what does your tombstone say about you? I hope that tombstone says, “She could write.”
Somber thoughts in a week that started with a trip to the ER for chest pains.
I am sorry to hear of your trip to the ER! That’s a scary thing to experience. But here you are, and all must be well, and for that, sending you positive vibes of YIPPPEEEE! :D
“She could write.” Well said, and much more succinctly than I did.
The ER was a learning experience; I have blogged about it. Hope not to repeat it.
I hope that for you too!
You had me at “death” (after almost losing me right out of the gate at “Valentine’s Day). Thanks for the entertaining and poignant piece, Kathryn. And for indirectly reminding me to include my CreateSpace and KDP login info in my will so my executor can fix any typos discovered in my novels after I’m dead.
For that I’ll be eternally grateful. Almost literally.
Oh, and since you have a penchant for the darker things in (writing) life, you might enjoy a piece I wrote not too long ago titled “The Best Ways for a Writer to Die.” The link to it is below. (Please note the piece lost all its Facebook “likes” after my web designer switched me to a knew platform. The horror!)
http://greglevin.com/scrawl-space-blog/the-best-ways-for-a-writer-to-die
Best,
GL
I meant a NEW platform, not a “knew” one. Oh, the horror again!
I laughed aloud (why don’t I just wrote LOL? I do not know – I just cannot seem to write it) at your reminder for your will. Unless I wasn’t supposed to laugh, then if not, insert proper emoticon
Thank you for the link! Maybe “knew” is a Freudian slip? I don’t No. (teehee)
Thank you for not using LOL. My respect and esteem for you has doubled due to that decision.
laughing
Your post reminded me of a blog post I wrote a few years back. Here’s the gist of it.
In my adolescence and early teens, I had the good fortune to spend a couple weeks of summer vacation on Cape Cod with my friend Anne and her family. Anne’s mom was a high school English teacher with a fascinating blend of etiquette and quirkiness. When we visited a local grist mill, she encouraged us to role-play Don Quixote fighting windmills; when we went clamming, we were treated to lengthy explanations of the plight of local fishermen. I came to expect a new perspective at every turn.
So the day she handed me a long roll of white paper and a brown wax block, I wasn’t surprised. “Where are we going?” I asked. “To the cemetery,” she said. “To collect poetry from old tombstones and hang them in the classroom.”
I’d never seen poetry on a tombstone, just names and dates and maybe a little phrase like, “Loving mother,” or “Forever at peace.” But I was game. And sure enough, in the old sections of Cape Cod cemeteries, she led us to whaling-era tombstones etched with elaborate poems. Poems about the brave young man whose life was cut short by the merciless sea, the fair maiden who walked the pier awaiting his return and probably still walks there today, the stooped old woman who watched from the Widow’s Walk atop her waterfront home, hoping and praying for her son’s return. Dutifully, I rubbed the wax block over the paper to catch the words beneath, then carefully rolled the paper until it could be hung in the classroom. Honestly, I’ve forgotten most of them.
But the sentiment expressed on a very simple tombstone has stayed with me to this day. It was a plain stone, etched with a woman’s name and the dates of her birth and death. Centered above that was the single phrase, “She hath done what she could.”
I sat back and stared, stunned by that beautiful truth. Such an incredible testimony to a life well-lived. What more can we want than to do what is within our power to do? This woman may not have had money or success in the eyes of the world, but she had used the power given to her.
All these years later, that simple phrase still resonates with me. When I wrote my novel Risking Exposure, I integrated the search for that truth, that power into the main character’s story line. The last words of the book are “I have done what I could.” A totally satisfying ending for a story, taught to me by the memorial of an 19th century stranger’s life.
“She hath done what she could.” Yes. And yes!
We have done what we could. Of course me being me I have to add “and I kicked ass!” laugh!
What a beautiful story written within this comment.
Thanks for adding a smile!
My Tombstone will read simply:
“But I Digress.”
Okay – this is funny – you had no way of knowing this, but the first draft I had of this post started out yammering about something more about V’s Day and how I detest it, and then I wrote, “but I digress . . .” and something or other about how I love to digress. I made mention of it later in the post when I compared something else I loved as much as I love to digress . . . . .
I had to delete it because it kept muddling the post. Dang. Yeah, I killed my darlin’ I was so proud of because I thought it pithy and funny – laugh.
So. There. Now you know.
“She was fearless, and a kickass kind of woman. She adored her readers, and they adored her back.”
Ride/write on! xo
Hi there, Angie! YOUR tombstone would be written by all those who love and adore you – and you’d hate it but we’d do it anyway.
Wow, what a beautifully written piece! Such music in every sentence…
Thank you for inspiring me on this Saturday morning. Your essay makes me think of Ben Jonson’s tribute to Shakespeare: “Thou art a monument without a tomb, / And art alive still while thy book doth live / And we have wits to read and praise to give.”
Maybe this can apply in a far more humble way for all writers.
Makes me smile to have you say that about “music” in the writing. I should write stuff out my butt more often! Okay, I write out my butt all the time, but still – as long as no one knows about me flying(writing) by the seat of my pants, all is well, right? Smiling . . . .
Love me some Shakespeare. Except Romeo & Juliet – *see comment above about how I detest Valentine’s Day – see post above about how much I don’t like smooshy stuff*
Kathryn, thanks for the beyond-the-veil post. One of the best cemeteries for witty or provocative tombstone sayings is the one in Key West, Florida (a cemetery that because of extreme flooding, has had many of the graves moved into above-ground vaults).
Incredible statuary and atmospherics there, but the gravestone sayings are the best. Here are a few:
“Devoted Fan of Singer Julio Iglesias”
“I’m just resting my eyes”
And my personal favorite: “I told you I was sick.”
I might just go with “You’re buying the next round.”
I have friends and family who love walking through gravesites, and can I admit I hate graveyards? They creep me out!
And I won’t take a photo because – okay, don’t y’all lose respect for me now, ya hear? – but I think the spirit of whatever I took a photo of will get in my camera ! Or a ghost will follow me home! EEEK!
*I am a sad sad weirdling of a woman*
Kathryn, I understand your qualms. As I understand graveyards, there are dead people there.
Lawd.
No, Tom. The politically correct term is “carbon unit deletions.”
Laughing !
“Does this tombstone make me look bald?”
Laughing! *with a snort cause I’m such a laaaaadyyyy*
I love how you’ve turned the tables (or the tombstones) on Valentine’s Day, that ridiculously smarmy, exclusivist excuse for selling cheap chocolate and greeting cards in the middle of winter. I’d much rather think about Death, that noble companion, than naked babies shooting bows and arrows. . . you said it beautifully, as well. Musically, I’ll agree. I want my tombstone to say, We End in Joy.
Now I want some chocolate- dang it!
We end in joy – smiling
After having made 3 trips to the basement to raid my chocolate stash I have the nerve to comment amidst all the “real” writers out there. I have been working with letters left to me by my mother who died over 30 years ago. As children, my sister and I were told her cedar chest contained love letters from Daddy and if we were to read them it would be a mortal sin. Yet she left them specifically to me. Finally I got the courage to read them and as a result I am creating a book that blends their letters and photos from the 1930 and 1940s with my reflections. Your descriptions of scattering ashes were beautiful. I also want to be cremated and have my ashes scattered on my parent’s graves. Somehow I feel the ashes will rest more easily knowing that I have honoured their lives, even before I was born, in my humble work. And I will leave something lasting for whomever might want to read about ordinary lives lived with love, humour and determination. Thank you
How beautiful and poignant this is. And a labor of love. I find it so interesting she forbid you to read their love letters, but then left them to you – she didn’t want them to be forgotten – she didn’t want her and your daddy’s love and life and youth and dreams to be forgotten – she knew what you’d do. Lovely. Just so lovely.
(And “real writers?” – You my dear are a writer. There is no doubt of that. Say it to yourself, yes, right now, three times, no four: “I am a writer.”)
Than you. That inspires me to continue.
This is why I write. I’ve been reading as far back as I can remember, and I’m talking cereal boxes just like all the stereotypes have it. But when I got serious, and began devouring novels the way I still do after all these years, the vast majority had a common feature — they were written by dead people.
I just took it for granted that it was our lot to toil in obscurity now and be discovered years or centuries later, and to change the lives of readers who think, “Damn, I wish I could’ve met him.” No, you don’t. Enjoy my books, future generations. I wrote them all for you.
We are rarely the person a reader wants to meet, since they really just want to meet our characters! :)