Cemetery in Windham, NY

The highest point of Main Street in Windham is occupied by a cemetery on one side and a steep drop-off to the other. Maybe there's a message there. Maybe not.

Every time I drive past, I don't think of the drop-off; I think of the tallest and most ambiguous gravestone in the cemetery.

Fig. 1: Does this bug you, God? I'm not touching you. Does this bug you?

I've never seen a gravestone with a finger pointing skyward, though I guess it's technically meant to point Heavenward. It's either taunting God, or teasing the living.

Fig. 2: See? That's where I'm going. To Heaven. Suck it, living people.

Hey, it was the 1860's; people were jerks back then (cf the Civil War).

Regardless of the intent, the figure is admittedly unusual.

Or is it? Laura claims that when the Prophet Mohammed was buried, his hand was left above ground (I didn't ask if the hand was pointing anywhere in particular). Furthermore, the first animal to start eating the superterranean hand was a pig, which allegedly is the reason Muslims are forbidden from eating pork. I don't know if the hand was left above ground for any specific reason (again, I didn't ask; man, I gotta work on my story listening skills), but I like to think that Muslims of the day were considering a ban on some particular foodstuff -- maybe there were competing shepherd factions or something -- and they left Mohammed's hand above ground to settle the dispute: "First animal to eat the hand gets banned!" Maybe we could solve the Mideast crisis by leaving a KFC Chicken Bowl on the Gaza Strip, and the first group to make a grab for it loses their claim.

What? Oh, the cemetery, right.

Here is the second interesting gravestone, which is ambiguous only if you're a jerk.

Fig. 3: No, the woman is not sad because she won't have the Butts to kick around anymore.

Isaac C. Butts ... I.C. Butts ... Icy Butts ... insert joke here. It's ok; he's been dead for 100 years, and maybe he was as big a jerk as the pointing guy above.

This gravestone introduces a topic that is unavoidable when discussing ye olde dead people: These people had crazy-ass names. In the case of the Butts, the "ass" part of "crazy-ass" suggests I could have chosen a different term.

For instance, there's the Mattoons:

Fig. 4: I wish they'd had a child named "Saska"

"Ransom A. Mattoon" sounds like a carnival booth for kidnappers.

And then there's Sonic Youth frontman Thurston Moore:

Fig. 5: It'll take more than a teenage riot to get him out of bed right now

Well, maybe this is not the Thurston Moore we know and love ... perhaps the Thurston we know and love was born under a different name and came upon this gravestone shortly after committing one crime too many, and decided to steal this dead man's name and use it to become an indie guitar god!

In the end, though, "Thurston Moore" should know that it will all come to naught. And then McDonald's will find a way to make a buck off it anyway. And maybe they'll call their sandwich ...

Fig. 6: Get it? Naught + McDonald's = ... nevermind

Yeah, that was pretty terrible. But it was also the first thing I thought when I saw it, and shouldn't honesty (and its snooty cousin, authenticity) be praised?

Answer: Yes, yes it should. Especially if it's me being uncharacteristically honest.