On our way to Swan Point to visit H.P. Minecraft

One of the big reasons that we were so excited about attending the Rhode Island Comic Con is because it put us close to Swan Point Cemetery. This was especially cool for me, because this trip was funded, in part, by a story I had sold to the Lovecraft Zine.

I love cemeteries. I always have. Every time I see one, I think of a line from Robyn Hitchcock's Airscape.

The tide recedes upon the bones of something beautiful and drowned.

Locally, we have Laurel Hill and West Laurel Hill. Should I ever make it to France, I'd really like to see the Meuse-Argonne American Cemetery and Memorial. My great-grandfather was involved in that offensive, but that's not the reason I'd like to attend. It just looks like a really beautiful place.

Kenobi Jen and Frederick also like cemeteries. They recently vandalized the grave where an orangutan is buried in the place of Edgar Allen Poe, and they wished to continue their reign of terror against HP Lovecraft's final resting place.

We drove around a bit, stopping every so often if there was a particularly picturesque monument to see, and we found the site. The leaves were turning and it was beautiful weather for a cemetery visit, chilly and overcast. It was a bit windy, too, however, and that made the act of getting the rubbing a little more difficult than it had to be.

Lovecraft's grave had a number of offerings near it.

Sorry, supplicants. Your offerings of pumpkin spice candles and escort service business cards aren't going to save you when the Old Ones rise.

 I'm familiar with the tradition of placing a stone on a grave to show it's been visited, and I guess this was a variation on the gesture. Either that, or someone was making it slightly more convenient for zombie Lovecraft to enter their house to eat their brains.

Jen Classic was sick and stayed in the car for most of it, though she popped out to take some pictures at my request.  Lily ran around and had a ball. My friends are very nice people. "Nice" is such a flabby word, but I think it fits here, because Jen and Jen and Frederick are all really decent,  thoughtful and considerate, taking the the time and putting in the effort to be good friends to people they like. Being both smart and kind is unfortunately a very rare combination, but these three folks have it in abundance, which is probably why Lily and I both like them so much.

I had this thought when Frederick let Lily perform a rubbing, while Kenobi Jen held the paper steady in the wind.

Lily knows the name Cthulhu, and can recognize a representation, but doesn't really have much of an idea of the whole Cthulhu, Mythos.(And I think I would be rather disturbed if she did, at seven years old.) There was a miscommunication and she thought we were visiting the grave of the guy who invented Minecraft. I thought that was pretty funny.

She used a couple different colors, and wound up with a very festive rubbing.

Sukie was the kid, she liked to hangout in the graveyard/She did brass rubbings, she learned you never had to press hard