Don't Give Me Reason To Ghost Ball Punch Your New Husband

Last Saturday evening Kait and I took a stroll through Calvary Cemetery in Greenfield. Along the bend near the main entrance, beside the newly built three-story mega-mausoleum, I noticed a large weathered tombstone with the last name BUTERA embossed across the front. (all names have been changed to protect the dead) Underneath the family name were two other names and dates: John Butera 1902-1943 and Cynthia Butera 1906-    . Initially I thought, "Man, Cynthia is old as crust." A few steps farther down the cobblestone path the truth reared its slobbering maniacal head. Cynthia died a long time ago, remarried, and left John to rot alone. Cynthia is buried alongside another lover!

I'm not going to begrudge Cynthia the decision to remarry. But poor John! Imagine his ghost wandering the cemetery, whistling Dixie and kicking a crumbled Sprite can every three steps until he stumbles upon the BUTERA headstone: his name and death date, and his (ex) wife's name and blank death date, open-ended like she's a weekend party (Cynthia 50's Beach Bash. Starts: 1906. Ends-???) If I were John's ghost, I'd make it my mission to seek out Cynthia's other headstone and land a haymaker squarely in Cynthia's burial mate's ghost nuts. Granted, Cynthia's new life (death) partner retains no fault, but John surely deserves to unload his eternal frustration in the form of a hereafter sac punch.

Of course, perhaps John was an abusive asshole in life and deserved to be buried alone, but anyway...

I truly felt sad for John. He's been forever left at the alter, so to speak. When John was on his death bed he likely truly believed that his beloved wife Cynthia -- who might've kissed him on the forehead amid his dying breath and whispered that they'd lie together again someday -- would live-out her remaining days in celibacy in lieu of an eternity together with her dearly departed husband. Sorry John; she loved someone else more than the memory of you. Now every passerby who examines the BUTERA tombstone and does the math should feel sorry for the poor lonely sona-bitch under their feet.  I wonder how Cynthia felt whenever she and her new hubby walked passed the BUTERA plot amongst a Sunday stroll. If she possessed but a crumb of decency she should've felt like a heap of cracked eggs for the fella' (who used to cuddle her during thunderstorms and stroke her hair in the beds of pick-up trucks during fireworks displays) under her feet. But like I said, I don't begrudge her decision to remarry. Not to dump eight pounds of salt in a festering chainsaw wound, but John is certainly partly to blame for deciding that the pre-death joint-BUTERA headstone was a jazzy idea.

At this point in the (what was supposed to be) leisurely walk through the cemetery I made Kait promise that she'd never request a headstone built for two, or, tandem-tomb. When I inevitably die 25 years before her I don't want her to feel the BOWER headstone is an everlasting reminder of a (now-defunct) vow or a landing spot for her beautiful corpse.  

Live it up baby; you ain't dead yet.*

*And I certainly don't want to spend eternity seeking to ghost ball-punch your new husband. I'd rather spend it whistling Dixie and kicking a crumbled Sprite can.