This year I took over 100 headstone photos in a cemetery where they weren’t.

Confused? So was I!

I drove through the gates of Memory Gardens Cemetery in the wee hours of May 24th. It was misting and I was rushed knowing the sky would soon give in to the threatening rain. A short distance in I could see beautiful old headstones on my right, so I got out of the car and quickly took 132 pictures. I left when the rain came.

Months later when I was able to add my pictures to Find A Grave, I was disappointed to learn the Memory Gardens memorials did not already exist. So I added my list of names and dates, and scheduled time to edit and upload my photos. During a subsequent global search, I found duplicates of my memorials. Or rather my duplicates of another contributor’s memorials. How could this be?

Remember how I had turned to the right after driving through the gate? The cemetery section I photographed is highlighted in green on the map below. Notice those diagonal lines? They show a section that doesn’t belong to Memory Gardens. The section in which I took pictures.

Ugh. I had entered the cemetery from the east. Had I come from the west, I might have seen the sign below.

All 132 of my entries had to be deleted from Memory Gardens.

No worries, another Find A Grave contributor had already added all those memorials to St. Peter. Where they belonged.

In a similar episode of the same sit-com, I took 92 pictures in the Garden of Everlasting Life Cemetery on October fourth. This cemetery doesn’t yet exist on Find A Grave. That’s sort of understandable when you see the signs at the entrance:

I can also understand how a first time visitor might get confused about which cemetery they are in. Thank goodness I always take pictures of the signs on the sections I photograph:

Turns out the headstones I photographed were already on Find A Grave, just in the wrong cemetery.

Tuesday’s Tip? Accept that some cemetery visits will be just that.

Not all the headstone pictures I take can be added to Find A Grave.

But every cemetery is worth visiting. Especially old cemeteries that may be deteriorating before our eyes.

Spontaneous stops don’t always result in finding headstones that were previously hidden.

Sometimes those stops serve as a reminder of how many Find A Grave volunteers there are.

Or how many more we need.

But nearly every cemetery stop touches my heart.