A place of Sorrow

As me and my dad enter through the rusted doors of the cemetery in Detroit I feel the sadness flow through my body like the waves on the ocean shore. The cemetery is still with the many headstones, except for the blowing of the wind, throwing leaves all around. The smell is a mixture of flowers and gas from a broken down car on the road next to the cemetery. I’ve only been going there since I was about 5, because being younger than that, made it hard for me to comprehend what our purpose for being there was. My dad had been going ever since his he was little, and lost many members of his family. Almost every mothers day, or birthday me and my dad drive the 30 minute drive to the cemetery to spend time with his mom, and baby sister in particular. We sometimes bring flowers or things to clean off the graves with. The terrible feeling of sadness that being there brings increases when we drive past the fountain and up the long hill to the section where babies are buried. My dad’s sister had died when she was born, so we visit her on her birthday or sometimes on Valentines Day. The feeling of sitting there on the cold hard ground with all the sadness flowing around me makes my body weak and thinking of all these lives that never got to be lived out, brings an even sadder pain to my heart. I sit there crying and he comes and gives me a big, strong hug and ushers me back to the car. We drive away and down the long road slowly, not saying a word to each other, but thinking about the loved ones we’ve lost, and how they’re still with us. This place represents sadness to me, but in a way, a sense of celebration to celebrate and to hold close the people that we’ve lost in our lives. This place isn’t a house, or a coffee shop, but a place that’s dear to my heart and the hearts of many other people, for it holds the spirits of mine, and their departed loved ones.