Happy Endings

Some women like dinner in a fine restaurant. Some like a picnic in the park. Some like a darkened theater and a tub of popcorn.

I also like these things when my husband and I get a few cherished hours to ourselves. I've had many a good date with my love doing all of the above.

But if he really wants to impress me, he knows to take me to a haunted house and cemetery, as he did this past Saturday afternoon.

If you've read more than a post or two from this blog, you probably aren't a bit surprised to hear of my affection for the morbid fantastical. It's not really morbid in my mind. I like old houses full of history and stories, so the Thurber House in downtown Columbus caught my attention and provided me with an afternoon of reveling in the quiet halls of the past. I like cemeteries, especially very old, very creepy cemeteries like Greenlawn in Columbus for sort of the same reason: history. My mind goes into blissful overload as I imagine who Cornelia August Weller was and why she died at the age of 21 in 1842. It just sweetens the experience when I read in fascination that "Those who knew her best loved her most." Was she lost to a cholera epidemic? Did she catch pneumonia? Did she give her life in vain to bring a stillborn child into the world?.

And what of Georgie Bowland who lived for only two short days in dismal February in the year 1852? What anguish did his parents experience as they laid their little son below the snow?

As we wandered on, we came upon the imposing stone mausoleum of the Hayden family that was built in 1904. Beautiful copper green with age elegantly lined the roof, and ornate metal covered the antiquated wooden doors. Chilled air blew between the dark opening and met our skin in a shocking difference to the 85 degrees of the air outside. I peeked in, and broken down stones and lonely oppressive atmosphere was my only greeting from the floor of broken tiles to the moss covered stain glass in the ceiling.

My husband and I began to talk about our own eventual mortality, should Jesus not return in our lifetime. Since I sincerely believe He will, I don't take death as seriously as my engineer minded husband. I told him in all truthfulness that I would like the eeriest looking statue that could be found to be placed atop my tombstone, so that in two or three hundred years I could creep out every visitor that came near. Since he would be sharing a stone with me, he was going to have to come to terms with that idea. He said that was fine. He asked me what I wanted written on my tombstone.

I thought of Cornelia, who was loved best by those that knew her most. I thought of Georgie, whose parents love lives on even after their own demise. I carefully mulled over the idea and finally said. "With Jesus." I decided. "Or maybe 'Finally.'"

No matter whether Jesus hasn't returned in hundreds of years. Whether I meet him in a cloud in the air, or I cross the darkness and enter His welcoming light through the shades of death, either way I will be with Him. Forever.

I guess that's why I like happy endings. No matter how sad the story is, no matter how fraught with trouble and heartache, if there's a happy ending, then it's all been worth it.

For every moment will be worth it all - when I set eyes on my Savior.


The first picture at the top is the haunted stairwell of the Thurber House on Jefferson Avenue in Columbus, Ohio. Well substantiated experiences of people including James Thurber himself report pacing in the dining room followed by the sound of someone running very quickly up the stairs. The rest of the pictures are from Greenlawn Cemetery in Columbus, which was opened in 1848.