A Grave Observation

     The following is a post that used to exist on an old blog I had that I am moving here. I went to school in England from January to June in 2012, and wrote a bit on my experiences. The following is an observation mostly on graveyards in England and partially on the urban landscape of the whole area, as opposed to the United States, which was primarily formed around the idea of cars, thus creating a more separated, expanding environment, versus England, whose areas were created in a walking environment, one where the transportation of cars was not yet available, and many buildings and areas had to be built close together for ease of access. 

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     So one of the first things I noticed when I came here were graveyards. It sounds odd to say, but it's true. It isn't like I went out and sought these places, but rather, they can be found everywhere around the UK. Go to the back of Leeds Uni, there's a "secret" park, which also happens to have a mausoleum and tombstones dotted all over it. Nearly every single cathedral or church that still is used for religious purposes has a grave site on the grounds. I was on a bus to London the other day, and, whilst passing a playground, which contained numerous children playing with their parents, happily laughing and enjoying their time, I saw that, hidden behind some shrubbery and flowers, were more tombstones. 

     Why is it that this interests me so much?

     For one, it's different than any kind of graveyard I've ever been to. Granted, I haven't gone to too many burial places, and I've never gone to a graveyard on the East coast, but, in general, there is a specific kind of format you can expect from graves. If it is a more formal one, naturally, there will be a lot of grass. All of the tombstones are arranged in a row. Groundskeepers do well to make sure it stays in good condition, and there is a certain reverence granted to these spaces. Even in more rural graveyards, this attitude remains. In La Joya, New Mexico, the graveyard is dirt. Some of the tombstones are made of wood. There are fake flowers that have been bleached by the sun and are either off white or a washed out version of the bright color they originally were. Yet, people still take care to make sure that this space is its own. People take care of the space, as well, by watering the little vegetation that is around. In a town close to Wichita, Kansas, there is a church with a graveyard in the back. Some of these tombstones are so old, they're written in German. There's even a section where they once buried the babies that died before they could be baptized, back when it was believed that if someone died before this, they would go to purgatory and had to be buried in unconsecrated ground (the ground has, since then, been consecrated). 

     So why is it that these graveyards in England are so different? The answer is in space and time, and it may reflect the view that people here have on the use of it and possibly death in general. 

     There are more contemporary graveyards around Leeds that appear to be of a nicer kind than the other graveyards I have seen. Although I haven't walked through one, there is one fairly close to Bodington that I occasionally pass by when going to Asda. The grass is green and kept. It looks quite nice, really. But, the spaces are still different. In the U.S., as I explained in one of my previous blogs, we are all about space. It is a private thing, a personal thing, and to invade it is just considered odd and invasive. For example, town homes in the U.S. are seen to be a bit below that of a general home, one where you don't have a neighbor attached to your own house. In England, most homes generally have a partner to it; it's divided down the middle and it almost looks like two people sharing one home, but, of course, they both have their separate lives to attend to, and they are no more than neighbors. Just look at Privet Drive in Harry Potter. Granted, the homes are made to look a bit more well off, but they are all connected, despite the fact that the Dursleys are living in a Suburb type area with the well to do. 

     In suburbs in the U.S., homes are quite divided. It is all about my space. My land. The separation is quite apparent. It almost appears isolated. 

     Graveyards reflect this idea, as well. In the U.S., each burial site is allotted a specific amount of space between other graves. Granted, there are smaller spaces and smaller graves, but, the same kind of ideal is applied. As in life, the dead rest in their own space. Furthermore, everything is generally very orderly and in rows. Disorder and graveyard do not really coincide. 

     I'm not trying to say English graveyards aren't orderly or don't respect the dead. However, the less contemporary ones, the tombstones that have been around for hundreds of years, do suggest an interesting use of space. 

     In general, the first thing you notice about the graves are that they are all in stone. It is England, though, so everything is stone. It's not different here. Yet, many of the older tombstones are in disrepair and are cracked in several places. What's more, the tombstones just seem to be pushed aside, more scenery than a marker of the dead. Perhaps this is coming from a superstitious part of myself where it is considered bad luck to walk on people's graves, but it always really struck me when a graveyard can be put alongside a path or a park and nothing is thought of it. 

     The use of space isn't the same. As you can see in the picture above, the tombs are quite close together, often overlapping. It makes for a spooky walk along the park to Leeds Uni, which is just beyond the path, but no thought is really given to the grave sites or the bodies that might be resting below them. 

     Again, I feel this reflects how the English view space and property. Also, this makes me think of the plagues and diseases that ravaged the land, where so many died, that there were barely enough graves to put the bodies in. Spaces for further development might've grown scarce if the grave sites were left to themselves. The idea of single-use spaces is a very American ideal (and is, honestly, a huge waste, too), and so why shouldn't graves be allowed to have other uses? After all, it can be supposed that most of these graves aren't visited or mourned. Most of the wording on them has been worn away, so you can't always tell who is buried underneath, anyway. But what does this say about how people in the UK view the afterlife?

     I'm not trying to imply anything, but the differences in graveyards does raise a lot of questions. It could do with a bit more research and observation, but a lot can be investigated just by a few visits to different sites. Also, a good deal of the differences might also be due to religion, considering my personal view of death and personal experience with graveyards has been Catholic, and most of England does not share this religion. In fact, the presence of religion is extremely toned down in England compared to the U.S. or New Mexico in general. But that's a blog for another day.