To pause in graveyard and weep at this

[BellaMagnificat]

Saddest I saw was this (witholding the family name)

In loving memory

Harold 1893-1896

Samuel 1904-1905

Wilfred 1897-1916 Killed in action

Ethel 1891-1917

Mabel 1893-1923

Nora 1900-1929

How utterly cruel. How did the families ever get past it?

I understand too.

YANBU.

Yanbu

What I find so hard about some of these graves is that this may be the only remembrance of their lives. It happened so long ago there may be no family left who thinks of them or even knows who they were. All that life gone and leaving no Mark apart from in the heart of strangers like you. 1'm glad you saw it and were moved.

To all,

PMSL, at this thread. I expect most of you on here were the ones lining the streets, crying hysterically, when Princess Di died. Of course its sad, but if you didn't actually know the person, then why would you cry?

My childrens primary school was next to a church and had an interconnecting bit that was shady and the kids could go to and have their lunch in the summer. Thre were also childrens graves there from years ago.

It used to make me smile knowing these children were still part of playground life.

Bit embarrassed for the posters who had to have the circs explained, after saying 'that's infant mortality innit'. The dates were right there. WWI anyone? And it wasn't 'normal' for women of 30 to die in their sleep. They probably died in childbirth, or of a specific illness. It would have been unexpected and shocking for the family.

sweetgilly I certainly didnt cry when Princess Diana died, I couldnt stand the woman, I did however feel sympathy for her sons.

But I will cry when I see a childs grave because having lost my DS when he was 1.5 yo I sadly know how it feels!

I cant begin to magine how it feels to lose 2,3, 4 or 5 of my children and I hope I never do.

The pain of losing your child is indescribable, and I dont think it would have been any different 100+ years ago!

YANBU but Salmotrutta is FFS !

sweetgilly well I can guaruntee that there won't be many crying when its your turn !

OnEdge Sat 26-Mar-11 08:07:07
sweetgilly

Well, I won't be around to know, will I? so hardly important.

I sobbed when the towers fell and I didn't know anyone who died in them.

I didn't know any of the people who died in Japan but it made me cry.

I didn't know anyone who died during the Holocaust but when I truly started to learn about it (think I was thirteen or so) I woke the house screaming from nightmares for at least a few weeks.

I just think how I would feel, the answer is very, very, horribly sad and/or afraid, and feeling how those people must have felt makes me cry for them and what they experienced.

as to why this is something to be laughed at.

Excuse me, I meant thinking how they must have felt, obviously nothing in my very lucky life has made me feel how they felt and I didn't mean to imply that.

expat that has made me cry reading that.

Bella - YANBU. I've often shed a few tears at the graves of people I don't know.
There is nothing wrong with being empathetic, the world would be a better place if more of us were more of the time IMHO.

CheerfulYank

Poor you. It appears you spend your every waking moment in tears.

sweetgilly - how depressing.

I did cry when Princess Di died, but not for her. I cried for her boys who no longer had their mummy.

I find old graves and memorials very moving. There is one in our local church to one of the younger sons of the local aristocratic family (not that that is particularly relevant or makes it more sad, just explains why he has got a great big marble memorial) from about 1880 - the turn of phrase is absolutely beautiful, something along the lines of (I will paraphrase this badly) "short was his time on earth/ but none could say too much so/God saw his ripeness for glory/and called him swiftly home" which makes me well up whenever I look at it.

I didn't know the two year old little brother of my great grandfather who died after suffering three hours of convulsions with his mother at his side through every second, but I cried when I read the death certificate which my mother found whilst doing her family tree research.

Ever heard of John Donne, sweetgilly?

expat :(

I hope that your Nanny was indeed met by her daughter.

Bella, I understand.

Snap alibaba.

LOL@ gilly. Actually I'm a remarkably happy person, but your comment reminded me of an insult I heard the other day wherein someone called someone else "owner of every third tear cried in America..." :o No, they weren't talking about me!

I don't go out of my way to cry, of course, but when I hear of terrible things happening to other people I can't seem to help putting myself in their shoes, and doing that often makes me tear up. I don't think you're a bad person for not doing this, I'm just unsure as to why you seem so derisive of people who react differently to emotion than you do.

Yank - in my experience people who are 'hard-hearted', consider it to be some kind of virtue.

YANBU. I am moved by a lot of things.

I cry when people I don't know die. I care.

My Nan's son died 2 days before his 21st birthdayt during the second WW and it destroyed her. They were a large family but that did not lessen the terrible all comsuming pain. The attitude that people had large families and just got on with it is incorrect. I have another friend who is 97 and comes for tea on a Sunday she often talks about her daughter who died when she was 5. She asks me if she will see her again, all these years later she yearns with all her heart for that little girl She has the blanket she knitted for her daughter that they used to cover her with when she was in bed on her lap every night whilst she watches tv. I did not know that little girl but I can still feel that Mums agony.

I think OP sounds like a lovely, caring person who understands the pain of others and is therefore moved by it. I get upset by some of the gravestones in the cemetary when you think of the pain of what those families have gone through.

What also saddens me is some of the postings on here demonstrate some people do not appear to have this capacity. Why can't you feel saddnest for a strangers pain? We all have pain in our lives that helps us to understand how loss affects other.

I don't think you are being unreasonable at all. You sound like a thoughtful and sensitive person to me, if only there were more like you.

I think some people are frightened of expressing their emotions. Those people are often angry because they bottle it up.

There is a world of difference between being wet and wishy washy and weeping all the time (I have a friend like this who I do have the urge to slap sometimes) ....and being a human empathetic being.

I understand, OP. I think graveyards are a poignant connection with our history - and with our humanity.

There is a graveyard at the little church in Zermatt, the ski town in Switzerland. As you walk in there is a grave on the right of an American boy. He was 18 years old and he was from New York. He died in the late 70s climbing the Matterhorn. It really struck me that grave, the English sounding name amongst the German and French, the fact that he was so young and died so far from home. I thought about his family, who are probably still somewhere in the States. I'll never know them, they'll never know me but every now and then I think about their son/brother - and the fact that he went on a big adventure and never came home.

RailwayChild

I'm in tears now.