By Halloween, the leaves are down. There's always a wind that sweeps the trees clean—all except the red oaks, which give up their leaves over the course of the winter.
The rest of the hardwoods show their bare form. Birds' and squirrels' nests are revealed.
Here is the maple on the Marty plot at the Lutheran cemetery, viewed from the south, on the day in 2008 when Mom went to take in the potted plant from the place Dad now lies next to his ancestors.
I've been going to the cemetery, spring and fall, my whole life, first with Gramma Marty. I looked for our plot by looking for the maple. That tree always seemed big.
The cemetery was once woods, then a pasture where cows grazed. When my great-grandfather came to America in 1880, his first job was running a dairy herd on that hillside and pasture, working for a relative who lived on Rush Creek. When Jacob died in 1918, his sons bought a family plot there to honor his journey.
Lutheran cemetery, Rush City, Minnesota, October 2008. Kodacolor. Photo by Gayla Marty.
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