graveyards grendel in the middle of the city, jackrabbits dart between the shrubs and headstones freeeway looms high overhead and around, noisy and rushed, in the midst of the trees and the manicured lawns, the silence overwhelms 091008 ... birdmad falcons circle overhead, from their lofty perches on the bank tower and around the high places a mile east in the heart of the city watching the rabbits and the pigeons and the assorted flights of smaller birds 091008 ... raze when we were young, someone put the idea in my sister's head that the ghosts of all the people who were buried in graveyards were floating around above their tombstones, waiting for a living body to slip into. they got into you through your lungs. it was probably her aunt who told her. she would say things like that. i used to bite my nails. she told me there were worms beneath the nail plates, and if i kept it up they would slither into my stomach and eat me alive. i never bit my nails again after that. whenever we would drive past a graveyard, my sister would hold her breath. she was terrified of letting the ghosts in. one day her father thought he'd have some fun with it. he saw a graveyard coming. he drove as slow as he could so she wouldn't be able to hold her breath long enough to clear it. when she couldn't stand it anymore, she took a quick gulp of air, and then she held her breath until her face turned red. i wonder if any ghosts got in. 211004 ... kerry i love graveyards but i dislike cemeteries. or maybe it is my image of the graveyard as a sea of tombstones softened by age, overgrown grass, iron gates; but a cemetery is more like tiles on astroturf. or maybe those are just the cemeteries i know. ellen's parents went to a graveyard on their first date. they're both artists, she does charcoal landscapes and he plays drums, and the potatoes in their kitchen always had so many eyes and i loved being there. also in high school we'd go shoot film in the graveyard with the pond and the mean geese, and i blathed about it here. we shot off firecrackers in the graveyard, me will and john and jo. and iz and i had a picnic in the graveyard where they lead the ghost tours. we brought a blanket--black and white because everything she owns is black and white--and we had pimento cheese and fruit and some wine. i wasn't taking as many pictures then but i have some shots of that picnic in the graveyard. 211004 ... tender square i remember ryan once telling me that university of windsor was unusual because it was across the street from a graveyard, and that was an uncommon characteristic for college campuses to have, though i can't verify how accurate that is. what's strange is bowling green state university also has a graveyard in the middle of campus. how i ended up going to school at two institutions with this feature i'll never know. 211005 what's it to you? who go blather from