Astronomy

Astronomy Ricky Cox There must be lots ofpractical reasons why people in Southwest Virginia put their cemeteries on tlie tops ofhills, but unless you find yourselfwith the now rare responsibility of choosing a spot to start a new one, knowing what they are probably isn't all that important. But even if there never were any compelling arguments, if half-remembered concerns about flash floods and contaminated water supplies are just old wives' tales, the hilltops would still be a right and natural place to bury and to be buried. Cemeteries should be on the tops of hills, as high as is practical, perhaps for the sake of those who lie there, but more so for those who walk there, for those who come once to close the book, and for those who return sometimes to open it. I have lived most of my life surrounded by hills, in hollows where the wind can get in only from certain directions, so the sound of a constant breeze is unfamiliar to me and I am compelled to listen to it when I am on top of a hill. But I think I would get used to it pretty soon, and it is rather nice for visitors of any sort, especially for the people who keep the grass mowed. In fact, that's how I got interested in cemeteries. It wasn't Tom Sawyer or Thomas Gray, but a Sears Craftsman lawnmower and an eight-month teaching contract that brought me to intimate acquaintance with a cemetery. For this reason, I like to think of my preoccupation with graveyards as a practical, semiprofessional concern, and certainly not as a morbid fascination. My initial interest in a newly discovered cemetery is topographical; I begin with offhand calculations about how often it would have to be mowed and how long the job would take. But there is much to be considered about cemeteries that concerns neither the grass nor what lies beneath it, if only because a cemetery is a good place to go to be alone and think about things. Mowing one gives you a good excuse to go there regularly with no risk of being talked about in tlie neighborhood. So if nothing else here makes sense to you, let me at least suggest that Ricky Coxgrew up in Floyd County, Virginia, where he now lives. He worked as a machinist for ten years before joining the faculty at Radford University. 46 ifyou have things to think about, and a reliable lawnmower, you might want to keep your eyes open for a shaggy cemetery, appropriately sized and located for a beginner. I secured my current position through a combination of personal circumstance and family obligation. The longtime caretaker of my father's family cemetery, a man who for fifty years owned the property surrounding it, died four years ago and is now buried in the back right-hand corner. The job of mowing was handled by volunteers for a couple of years, but more stable arrangements were needed. Knowledge of my interest in genealogy made me a natural in the eyes of the search committee , and since I am a school teacher it was perceived that I had nothing to do during the summer, and assumed that I wasn't really busy in any other season. The clincher was that no one else was even remotely interested. And now that we've got the fence patched up and painted, keeping die grass mowed is not such a bad job. Our cemetery lies on tlie highest point available to the people who started it more than a century ago. It may have been surrounded by woods but I doubt it, for it seems to belong where it is, in the middle of a big hayfield. The waving grass surrounding this piece of ground in late summer makes me think of an ocean, or a lake, and when die wind moves over and through it, even the most unimaginative must think, at some level, of some kind of spirit moving across the face of the land. The-wind blows on that knoll if it is blowing anywhere in sight, unmindful of whether the hay...