The tug of history

This past Thursday, I drove 2 1/2 hours north into Central PA, to an old, small, red brick church in the country.  The occasion was the funeral service and burial of my Great Aunt May, and the venue was the church where I was raised, located within view of the farm where I grew up.

The minister was new to the church and didn’t know Aunt May well, but he said he learned much during his meeting with her five children. In particular, he said he found great comfort in knowing that May would take her eternal rest in a place where many generations before her also chose to be buried. It warmed his heart, he said, to think that she would be surrounded by her ancestors.

It’s true, she’s buried next to her first husband, my Uncle Gilbert, but technically, the little cemetery in the valley holds many generations of his family, not hers.  Nevertheless, she proudly took the Beaver name when she married.  She even researched and wrote a geneaology book, outlining the descendants of George Beaver of Pfoutz Valley, PA. It was this George who, in 1878, would be the first of many to be buried in that quiet plot of land that is surrounded yet today by fields of grain.

As I exited the highway and drove through Millerstown, turned right to go up the hill, past my high school, then out into the valley, I felt as if I was being transported back in time. (The Simple Minds song on the radio helped.) I used to drive from home to school a couple of times a day and joked then that I could probably drive it with my eyes closed.  I used to know who lived in every house along the five-mile route. Now, I know many have been sold to new occupants. Things are “turning over” in the valley.

The inside of Pfoutz Valley United Methodist Church hasn’t changed much since I left home for college in 1985. The same portrait of Jesus hangs on the wall over the same gold cross on the same altar furniture.  Ginny played hymns on the same organ I used to practice on during that one year I took lessons in high school.  Food for the post-funeral luncheon was arranged on the table in the kitchen where my Sunday School class met when I was a teen.  Several of the men and women who watched me grow up were there, attending to the food so that the mourners could eat and visit with each other.

I understand what the minister was trying to say, about finding comfort in being surrounded by so much history. He remarked that many people don’t have that. I moved to the DC area almost 20 years ago and figure we’ll stay here at least until the kids are grown, if not longer. But when I think about where I would want to be buried, my mind always wanders back to the little cemetery in the valley. My dad’s there, my grandma and grandpa are there, and all those generations of ancestors, a little piece from whom I carry within my own genes.  Also, I like how the cemetery is next to the church. Around here, there are huge “memorial parks” that have no church association. Our own church doesn’t have its own cemetery.   It just makes sense to me for one to be buried next to the place where one worshipped.

But would it make sense for my survivors to cart me the whole way up there?  Not really. It’s not practical. I mean, I spent only 16 years of my life there. But they were the formative years. The ones that really leave a big impression on my soul.  And even though I’ve been gone now for more years than I lived there, I still feel the tug of history, the pull of that connection to those who went before.

Rest in peace, Aunt May

May Jarrett Beaver Zink

April 22, 1912 - September 7, 2009

Bob Zink, May J Beaver Zink, and Rev. Jim Grubb on October 2nd, 1993

Aunt May was my great-aunt. My father’s aunt. My Grandma Sara’s sister-in-law… and her next-door neighbor for many years (if adjacent farms can be considered “next door” ). They married brothers, my Aunt May and my Grandma Sara. And they each buried their husband in the early 1970s as both fell victim to melanoma, the same cancer that would eventually claim my father. (PSA: Wear your sunscreen! Seriously!)  They each remarried, and both eventually outlived their second husbands, too.

The photo above was taken at our wedding reception in October, 1993. Aunt May is pictured here with her second husband, Bob, and the Rev. James Grubb, who was one of the ministers who married us. (Rev. Grubb was a high school friend of both my parents, and was Curt’s minister when he was growing up in Williamsport, PA.)

Aunt May almost seemed more like a third grandma to me than a great-aunt. She graduated from Dickinson College in the early  1930s; her youngest son, Dave, followed her there in the mid-1970s. Dave and his wife Lyndy, also a Dickinsonian, opened their home to me in 1990, right after I’d graduated from their alma mater and took my first job in Washington, D.C.  Aunt May thought it was super-cool that I went to Dickinson, too. She was always very supportive of me.

My cousin “Mame” and her friend were high school French students of May’s in the early 1970s. Recently, they visited her at her nursing home. “Bonjour, Madame Beaver, comment t’allez vous?” they said in greeting.  May replied, very deliberately, “Comme Ci, Comme Ça.”

Eternal Rest

Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord,
and let perpetual light shine upon them.
May they rest in peace. Amen.

Requiem Æternam

Réquiem ætérnam dona eis, Dómine,
et lux perpétua lúceat eis.
Requiéscant in pace. Amen.