52 Ancestors – 52 Week

Tombstone: headstone marking a person’s grave. (Collins English Dictionary) Originally, stones lay flat on the gravesite and served two purposes: to mark the resting place of the deceased, and to keep her/him from rising from the dead. Nowadays, the purpose of the tombstone is to be a suitably beautiful monument dedicated to the deceased person. (WikiDiff)

The writing prompt for Amy Johnson Crow’s Generations Cafe members for Week 21 is Tombstone. I have pictures of many of my ancestors’ tombstones, some even back to Ireland. I decided to write about my parents’ tombstone because I know if its history.

My dad, John Joseph Fitzgerald, died on November 4, 2000, just six months after he was diagnosed with advanced prostate cancer followed by lung cancer. Dad had several bouts with cancer through his later years. He was probably about 65 when he was diagnosed with melanoma,  a type of skin cancer that develops when melanocytes (the cells that give the skin its tan or brown color) start to grow out of control. It is the most invasive of skin cancers and if left untreated leads to death.

Dad was successfully treated for melanoma and then followed a number of skin cancerous cells which were removed from his face over the years. When he was diagnosed in 2000 with melanoma, dad and the family were devastated as the prognosis was not optimistic. He suffered through five months of chemical and radiation treatment and was put in hospice the last month he was alive.

My parents had made no final arrangements, not even a grave site. My siblings and brother-in-law were tasked with that by our mother. On a dreary, rainy day in November 2000 we searched for a grave site in the cemetery where they would be buried.  My sister Jean Terry suggested we choose a site under a tree. She said that a tree always reminded her of Dad putting up our swings on the first nice spring day. Also it reminded her of Ma tying her little dog Molly to a lawn chair and sitting under the tree on the front lawn. My brothers, brother-in-law and I agreed with Jean that lying under a tree would be a comforting resting place for Dad and Ma. The site was chosen.

The choice of the tombstone was left to my mother, Mary Flannery Fitzgerald. She indicated that she wanted to do that when the time was right. Winter passed and she did not bring up the tombstone until June 2001. My brother Tim made the arrangements for meeting with the monument masonry group that served my parents’ cemetery and a tombstone was selected and the inscription was finalized.

The tombstone was placed on the grave in mid-September 2001. My mother’s comment when that was done has remained with me all these years. She said, “Well now that’s done.” The comment struck me as if she was telling me that taking care of the tombstone was the last thing she had left to do on this earth. Six weeks later she passed away and we were left planning her funeral. My parents died 11 and a half months apart.

I will add a picture of the monument when I get to the cemetery to take a picture of it.