Cemeteries and Tea Parties

Cemeteries and tea parties to the average person have nothing in common nor would one assume they even go together. Would you plan a day where you went from a cemetery to a tea party? One usually chooses one or the other and does not attempt both in one day; I am not that person. 

Though I must say when all of this was planned it never occurred to me that to spend the morning in the cemetery, eat lunch and then attend a tea party would later sound odd. But yes, we would go from digging in the dirt on our hands and knees, to drinking tea and eating finger sandwiches.


Arriving at the cemetery we unloaded the car, placed my grandmother in the shade and went to work. Digging, pulling weeds and planting new flowers, all done to observe Memorial Day. As like every other year I had done this with my grandmother she reminded me, “Isn’t that the angel you knocked its arm off?” Yes it was, no I will never live that down and now right behind my Aunt’s grave is a one armed angel. Let’s move on.

So on we went to the tea party, formal as an affair can be at the assisted living facility. We entered the room where they had placed white table linens, put out a pretty spread of small tea party goodies and even hired a harpist for entertainment. We sat in the rear of the room next to the harp.

I went through the line to retrieve our tea party goodies, returned to the table and sat down to enjoy. As we sat there trying to hold a conversation over the harp playing not three feet from us it became clear the harp was bothering my grandmother. Though she knew the harpist the volume and proximity had gotten to her and just as we noticed this she declared, ”I hope she gets through that song book soon.” Followed by, “stop laughing or she will know we are talking about her,” all the while I’m pointing to the two-foot stack of sheet music beside the harp. Needless to say the tea party was over.

The moral of the story: while the cemetery reminded me of my miss-spent youth, the tea party allowed me to laugh at what I’m sure to become.

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