The Promise

 

This morning, I fulfilled a promise that I made nearly two years ago to my great-grandmother, Rose. The setting: a neglected grave, overgrown with evergreen shrubs; a headstone with an incorrect birth year and a missing death year; and the mysterious disappearance of a ceramic photo tile, once attached to the headstone, but since lost. Seventy years ago, in 1955, Rose was buried in Las Cruces, New Mexico, next to her second husband, Charles, who had died in 1938. Her family being primarily in Colorado, and his family in Texas, time and elements, along with fading memories, took their toll and their final resting place was forgotten. Until I discovered it again through my genealogy research. The decision to find someone who could engrave dates on the headstone was easy, as was asking for some pruning and maintenance of the site around the grave. As someone who had spent many, many hours uncovering the story of Rose’s life, and who had become emotionally invested in telling it, there seemed to me to be no other choice. And now, finally, the last step had been accomplished.

 

I had seen an earlier photo of Rose and Charles’s headstone where, in the center, between their names, a photograph of the two of them had been affixed. It was eerily beautiful, I thought, to have this image of them in life at their final resting place, but when I commissioned the repairs and corrections to be made to the headstone, I was told the photo was nowhere to be found. Decades of New Mexico weather, I supposed. Or vandals. But when the workers I’d hired removed the stone from its base to take back to the shop, they found the lost photo tile buried in the dirt. A few months later, I decided to go back to Las Cruces to see the restored headstone for myself. I was surprised to find the tile sitting unsecured in the recessed square where it had originally been affixed. Obviously, I couldn’t just leave it like that, or it would fall out again, perhaps this time breaking. Sitting on the ground, holding the cool ceramic tile in my hands, I pondered what to do next. I decided I had two choices: Take it home and keep it or figure out a way to permanently reattach it to the headstone. I wasn’t a mason. I also wasn’t very handy with any kind of repair work. Besides, it was November, and cool. I decided to take the tile home, keep it safe, decide how to accomplish the task, and come back when it was dry and warm, and finish the job. "I'll come back in the spring," I said out loud. "I promise."

 

Six months of having the photo tile sitting on a little easel on my bookcase and I realized I didn’t want to let it go. I loved holding it in my hands, feeling its smooth, slightly curved shape, and running my finger over the faces of Rose and Charles. The photo had turned slightly yellow, and was chipped along the edges, revealing a copper backing, but I felt a myriad of emotions when I looked at it. Rose had chosen this photo- it was from when they’d gone to Colorado to secretly elope in 1920. Although they were no longer young, their faces were smooth and relaxed, and both wore slight, gentle smiles of happiness that belied the scandal they had caused back in Kansas. They kept their marriage a secret for four months- Charles returning to Las Cruces, where he’d started a business and was living, and Rose returning to her parents’ farm in Western Kansas, where she’d been living after being turned out by my great-grandfather after the discovery of her and Charles’s affair. Eventually, her divorce from my great-grandfather became final, and she took a train south to join Charles in their new life.

On Saturday, I parked my car at the cemetery and took a bucket of tools out of the back. "Hi, I'm back," I said. "I'm going to finish the job." I spread a beach towel on the ground, got out a wire brush, water, and rags, and went to work on the dirt and bird droppings that had accumulated. I used a paint brush to clear the dirt and then, carefully unwrapping the tile from where it was carefully packed, I held it for a long time. I really didn’t want to let it go; I wanted it to always be with me on my bookshelf. But I also knew that it wasn’t mine to keep. It belonged to Rose, and she had chosen it specifically to be placed on the headstone.  I spread the caulk into the recessed square, and oh so carefully positioned the tile as straight as I could. Taking a deep breath, I pressed it into the caulk, wiping away the stray bits around the edges, and held it firm. Placing blue painters’ tape over the top, I sat back and nodded with satisfaction. “I’ll be back on Monday to check how it looks”, I said. I packed the tools, shook out the towel, and drove away. 

That night, an unexpected thunderstorm rolled in, and I lay in bed worrying about whether the caulk had had time to set and if the rain would pull the tape loose. But the next day was warm and sunny, and this morning when I carefully pulled the tape from the tile, I saw the serene faces of Rose and Charles, firmly restored to their rightful place. I pressed around the edges- no movement.  I sat, satisfied and peaceful, listening to the wind and the doves, and I hoped that, somehow, my great-grandmother knew what I had done, and that she was pleased.