The Weekend Memories

Memorial Day Weekend in Renton - a couple of days strung together with a holiday and you get time to recreate and remember. Some, like our furry downtown friend Lucky, carries his spirit of the season with a red, white and blue collar. Go Lucky!

Others, like Bob Davis, hold a BBQ for friends and sundry, inviting them to come and swing some red and blue nunchucks to show their mad martial art skills. Bob assures me that girls like men with skills. Dina, Bob's wife, was unavailable for comment.

Many of us went to remember family members and friends who had served in the armed forces over the years for our country. Veterans of all wars were honored this day with flags, poppies, and the red, white and blue.

Mt. Olivet Cemetary, Renton's Pioneer Cemetery, is a beautiful and quiet place to visit and be reminded of the import of the holiday.

June 1st - can you believe it? I don't know about you, but I can't believe that summer has already begun.....
Hope you had a great weekend to inaugurate the season.

Remembering

Veteran's Memorial - downtown Renton, corner of Main Ave. South and South Third Street. Erected in 2003 - and a beautiful spot. The last couple of days prior to the weekend I saw workers finishing some updates on the walls in time for this holiday. And people visiting, like these ladies here, to find dear names of family and friends and to share in remembering the souls that our nation has lost.

American Legion Memorial to Veterans of All Wars - located in the pioneer cemetery, Mt Olivet. It was a bright, blue day and the cars were steadily pulling in to disgorge family members, young and old, flowers and flags in hand to pay their respects. It was heartwarming and it was touching.

The Newly Departed

Mt. Olivet Cemetery is the final resting place of Renton's Pioneers. It has tombstones from the mid 1800's - entire families sharing plots side by side for generations. But there is always room for new generations to come to rest on this grassy knoll above the city - and so it is that a large Asian community has begun to place their ancestors just outside the front gates at Mt. Olivet.

Having lived in Asia myself for sometime, I can say that the feng shui of Mt. Olivet is regarded as highly auspicious and sought after - water in the front (a wonderful view of Lake Washington) with a green hill/mountain behind the graves. This rather new development of tombs is beginning to fill up.

Above are some photos of a recently departed soul's flower arrangements and offerings. The belief is that the afterlife is modeled on our life here on earth. The newly dead will need food and money in the other world, so fruit and meat are placed at the grave, and the red metal urn is for burning paper money and other paper effigies of items that might be of use to the dearly departed. I have even seen paper cars created and sent through the flames to the other side.

You'll be feeling the pain if you take a walk up the hill to see the view - but the workout is well worth it. Our Pioneer Cemetery is a beautiful shrine to our yesteryears and now, our new tomorrows. We'll all end up, hopefully, somewhere just as lovely. I would love to imagine my relatives coming to picnic on the hill, partaking in the lush green and blue hues of this preserved piece of Renton.