The Haps

The Spoooooky Graveyard

Chapter Three.
One of my goals on the drive out to Seattle was to connect with some of my family history. My father grew up in Oregon and along the I84 there are a lot of locations where he lived. I have always felt drawn toward my father's family history and have always wanted to make it out westward to experience. The move to Seattle has become a special way of fulfilling that.

One of my goals was to visit my Grandfather's grave in Baker City, Oregon. I never met him, he passed away at a very early age, but I have loved the stories my Dad has recounted over the years. He was a hard worker. He was determined and often built things of his own design, such as homes and church houses.

We made it into Baker City around 7pm. The city is in a valley and surrounded by mountains, so it was getting quite dark. A kind man at the Kwik-and-Go informed me of how to arrive at the cemetery. Let me tell ya, it was in that one part of town where nothing is. Doug and I drove up to the gates and it was dusk. We couldn't see. There were many graves and I knew we wouldn't be able to get out and look at all of them. Needless to say, neither of us wanted to really get out of the car, it was a little scary. What made it even more scary was the names of the "streets" inside the graveyard. The first was "Ash" and the second was "Birch." Now that is Doug's last name, so we were both a little weirded out. "Chestnut" followed by "Delta" followed by "Elm." At this point we started to get a little frightened. "Nightmare on Elm Street." Ring any bells? We were trying to call my parents for a clue as to where the headstone might be. The phones were crackling, I accidentally revved the engine while in park. It was all too campy. It honestly felt like a teenage horror movie. At any second we knew some creepy ghoul zombie was going to pop up out of nowhere and attack us.
We made it out safe and took some time at the front of the gate to take pictures and such. All and all it was fun, but I still would love to make it back and pay my respects to my grandfather...in the daylight.

posted by Spence-a-lick @ 1:37 PM