There Are Stories Under Those Monuments

(Reynolds, GA) I was in town this afternoon for a photo shoot for the cover of my new CD that will be released next month.

Since I don’t exactly own a hearse anymore, I had to borrow one as a prop for the photographer. I drove the hearse across town to Hillcrest Cemetery, which is very familiar ground to this country undertaker.

The photographer rode in the back (I had another passenger in the front) and he even snapped a picture during the ride.


He surprised me when he asked if I could turn on the air conditioner in the back. I was not surprised that he wanted some air. I was surprised because I never get questions from the person riding in the back of the hearse.

Anyway, I’ve been to that cemetery thousands of times but never to pose for pictures.

The interesting thing about cemeteries is there is a story under each monument. In this cemetery a story of a life lived in Reynolds, GA. These are stories that should be told.

I posed for pictures real close to the grave of Sink Marshall. His wife, Anne, was a music teacher and there is no telling how many people she taught to play the piano. Their daughter, Bunny, was a year younger than me and she was one hot mama when I was growing up. I still get frazzled thinking of her in that purple bathing suit she used to wear at the Whatley’s swimming pool.

Sink played one of the greatest practical jokes ever played in Reynolds. Brother Allen Johnson, the Methodist preacher, had made a trip to the Holy Land. He had his carrousel of slides at the club house and was about to do the program for the weekly Kiwanis Club meeting. Sink had a few slides of scantily clad women and substituted a few of his slides for Brother Johnson’s Holy Land slides.

Of course, everybody in the club knew what Sink had done… except Brother Johnson.

You can imagine the preacher’s embarrassment as he moved from a slide of the Mount of Olives to a slide of Raquel Welch’s mounts.

Brother Johnson quickly moved to the next slide.

After a few more of these slides, Brother Johnson started looking for Sink. He knew the culprit.

I remembered that story today.

I also remembered the day of Sink's funeral service. A huge crowd gathered at this cemetery as he was honored with a full military funeral. Very appropriately, a train came by blowing its whistle as the ceremony ended. It caused the hair to stand on my head that day.

There are stories under those monuments. And the stories have the potential to cause us all to smell the roses along the way.

They need to be told.