Growing Older doesn’t mean you have to Lose Your Traditions
What do you do in celebration of Memorial Day? Are those activities based on traditions that you started or that your family has been doing for years or even generations? Our Memorial Day traditions have changed over the years. At different times we have done all of the things that our parents did with us, but as an older couple we have settled in to what Rich’s family always did- BBQ, family and fun. Traditions are so important in families. They help to create a sense of structure, grounding and pride. Growing older doesn’t mean you have to lose them. You can create new ones, re-live them through your children or share your fond memories.
I’m not sure that I knew until adulthood, that Memorial Day was founded to celebrate and honor the service of Civil War Soldiers killed in the war. I do have a vague memory of either my grandmother Grace and my father referring to it as Decoration Day. When I learned that it started after the Civil War , I still thought it referenced the concept that you went to the cemetery to decorate family grave sites. I actually read that one of the earliest Memorial Day celebrations was by formerly enslaved people in Charleston, South Carolina in the mid 1860s. After a couple more wars- it became a celebration to honor US service people in all wars. It then became common to honor those who had died in our families by visiting cemeteries and leaving tokens of remembrance, including flowers. Today, they often won’t let you bring or plant live flowers or they manage what you can leave at the site and when you can leave it.
This past weekend we had hoped to meet our dad’s 92 year old first cousin Tom, at the cemetery in their hometown to pay our respects to the family members buried there. Traveling to Marshalltown also always provides an opportunity to drive through the community and see what’s changed. Our family helped to start three churches when they arrived in Marshalltown from the Alabama in 1917. Two of them are shown below.
We always drove past them to see what condition they were in and whether they were still having services. As the number of African Americans in Marshalltown had ebbed and flowed over time, the churches membership had also declined.
African American Church History in Marshalltown, Iowa.
Just recently, Cumberland Presbyterian was torn down. (2021) Whenever we came to town, we immediately became the church choir as my mom played piano and there were 5 of us children.
As a child, we always took some time over the Memorial Day weekend to visit the cemetary and place flowers. It was a chance to do some grooming of the site, including pulling back any weeds or overgrowth that was encroaching onto the stones.
At some point we starting using the Memorial Day weekend as the beginning of the camping season. When our children were younger, we continued a tradition of having Memorial Day weekend being the first camping trip of the season.
When they became teenagers our tradition changed to Memorial Day being the first BBQ of the season and has landed there. It has been great to watch our sons maintain many of our family traditions and to also start some of their own.
It’s refreshing to see those traditions continue or want to be continued. Traditions provide not only great memories established with your family, but learning experiences. Although I have only been one or two times in the last 20 years, I could with complete confidence go directly to the area that my family is buried in.
My son and his family, going fishing- may turn into camping.
What’s your Memorial Day tradition? Please let me know in the comments!
Happy Memorial Day!
Earthen Sojourner 