For as long as I can remember my parents have been obsessed
with death. Not death in the sense that they enjoy it, that they revel in
horror movies or have a macabre longing for Hollywood style blood and gore. But
death in the sense of searching for knowledge of those who came before us. Of what dead relative belonged to
whom, where were they buried, who were they buried on top of and why was that particular
plot chosen.
For as long as I can remember almost every conversation with my
mother and father inevitably comes around to a dead relative, the cemetery they
were buried in, details about the grave-site and those buried with them.
In the beginning these conversations irritated and infuriated
me. Slowly though, I have been worn down, my fortitude eroded away and I now find myself trapped, wrapped up in their veil of death. I find myself, after all these
years of resistance, becoming curious about these dead people, these dead relatives.
 |
| Emma Simonetta Croal |
I confess I have been less than patient with my parents on
this subject. My sister and I have swapped countless eye rolls each time this subject comes up at family gatherings. Almost certainly because the subject
comes up at every family gathering. My parents will happily discuss for hours people we have never heard of, aunts, uncles, cousins, people so foreign to us that
they are no more than strangers on the street. People I feel no connection to,
they are only names. Only faded photos. Only grave stones in a cemetery
somewhere. No flesh and bone. No
history. No story. They mean nothing to me. They meant nothing to me, until
now.
Quite some time ago my grandmother’s family on my mother’s side
had a family reunion, held here, in Canungra. I thought nothing of it at
the time. I thought nothing of it twenty five years later when we moved here.
It was a family reunion with a lot of people I didn’t know, in a nice park, a
chance to have a picnic. Nothing more, nothing less. The significance of that
family reunion was lost on me. The significance of that family reunion
continued to be lost on me even as we signed a contract for a property, this
property, in Canungra.
“Your grandmother was born in Canungra” my mother informed me
after I shared the news of our purchase.
What?
How did I not know this?
Too much eye rolling, I
suspect.
Unwittingly, I found myself located in the midst of my, my mother’s, and my grandmother’s
family history. Within
walking distance of the very graves and dead relatives that have ‘haunted’ me
all these years. Their names are in the streets and the parks and are known by
the locals. Adams, George, Rieser. There is no escaping them. And I’m not
sure I want to.
The one dead relative I have always resisted
is my great great grandmother, Emma Simonetta Croal. Her name has been at the centre of many of these interminable conversations on dead
relatives. She has been mentioned, talked about and threshed over to a
point where I never considered her as a person.
But she was someone. She was a woman who was buried in
the cemetery just outside of our little village, in an unmarked grave. Her marker, for reasons know only by those also long dead, is located in another cemetery located on the
other side of village. What a curious thing to do. Why would someone do that?
Now I am curious. Damn it. Now I need to know. Suddenly Emma has flesh, Emma
has history, Emma has a story.
Suddenly, I need to know her story.
