Two years and half a pandemic later, I return to Charleston as a small beach trip with two college friends to celebrate the middle of Summer. But my eyes were not on the beach, they were on the dead. I know where I am going. My first stop: St. Phillips Graveyard. I rush there, dragging friends along, foregoing a day at the beach for a day of graveyard adventures. And what do I see?
The churchyard was closed due to COVID. Also, if you take a closer look, you'll notice that they did something tricky there. That "Graveyard Temporarily Closed" sign became... a lot less temporary.
Skip forward a few months and you'll find me graduated from college, working as a graduate assistant and in a Master program, desperately needing an escape from my at-home office. I take a trip to the beach for a week FOR the beach; not for gravesites. Despite the dry October air, a day of rain comes, actually flushing me off the beach it what would otherwise have been a beautiful sunrise over the ocean. The forecast was on and off with rain for the entire day, so I figured it better not to get in a swimsuit, all sunscreened, all sandy and everything, only to be chased off the beach again by rain. So the day became a downtown day.
Now I had been calling the Charleston churches for months trying to get an answer on when the graveyard would be open again, when the repairs would be finished, and so on. As I am driving from the beach to downtown Charleston, I get a feeling about the day. "This is the day," I say, "I can feel it." My friend looks at me in question and asks how I know. I can't explain it. I had a feeling that I would get into that one elusive graveyard today.
We pull up into the city and start walking around. We see the old buildings, the markets, and carriage tours pass us by as we enjoy the cool October breeze mixed with hot Southern sun. The city is fresh from the recent rain. It was about 9 am, but as the morning faded, the sun grew hotter and Charleston returned to the way many people have known it. This was the third time I had been to Charleston, so I was beginning to know the city pretty well. After a few wrong turns, past the outdoor markets, and a cut through a parking lot, I see the top of the church gates. A few steps closer and I see the same infamous sign and : Graveyard closed for repairs. NO! I ran around the perimeter, thinking, hoping, that one gate might be open. After grabbing the fence poles in feigned, yet dramatic, agony, I felt like the Eric Andre meme where he shouts "LET ME IN!" and then shakes the fence gates.
I pulled up the church number on my phone and called. For the first time in a long time, I got a human instead of an automatic message! She told me the eastern cemetery was closed because part of the church building that borders the graveyard was old and had stucco and roof tiles falling off. They didn't want pedestrians in the stucco-attack zone should one happen to come down. While the west graveyard across the street would remain open, the east graveyard would be closed indeterminably until the repairs could be made. She suggested coming back at a future time. But I had done exactly that- come back so many future times. And after what was in reality 2 and half years- I had been disappointed today. So much for my feeling.
At that moment, we see a man in a blue shirt walk through the graveyard and then into a little side door. I away from the graveyard and around the side of the building until I find I door. I literally paced back and forth outside wondering if I should interrupt some church person's day for the sake of entertaining what some might see as a juvenile adventure, but my friends affirms me in my quest, and we ring the buzzer. Through the door, we can see a woman sitting at a desk, likely the church administrator. I do not know if she saw us or not, but she definitely didn't stand up to get the door. Just as we were contemplating buzzing a second time, a priest with a young girls in tow walks out of the building. We are able to slip in behind him. He did turn around, asking us if we needed help, at looking at us like we were two people in a weird place at a weird time (to be fair, I worked at a church and if we had a stranger show up on a weekday morning, I also would have given them the same look.) We walk up to the administrator behind the desk and ask about the graveyard. She seems confused at first then realizes that I am the one who called her on the phone a few minutes previous. Her eyes seem to size me up and down as she thinks. After what seemed like an eternity, she smiled and said "Let me call the sexton for you."
Sure enough, blue shirt guy returns, desk lady gives us a map, and we are whisked away down a hallway full of church offices and through a side door, emerging out into the graveyard. We spoke with the sexton, each explaining a bit about each others' lives, blindly feeling at those invisible strings that brought the three of us together alone in this graveyard on a warm Thursday morning. He had the gait and firmness of a man who had worked among the dirt and the dead for ten years. I tried carefully to balance my overwhelming excitement and nonchalance, to make apparent the great appreciation I had for this personal graveyard tour but not seem like a crazy person who was obsessed with the dead. As if having read my thoughts, he looked back at me while we were walking. "I have to deal with a lot of crazies here." Many people sneak in at night, to come hang out, take photos, or do more nefarious things. My friend later noted that my balance between fanatic and normal found myself right at the cusp of 'perfectly passionate.' A short walk brought us to the unassuming grave of Edward Rutledge. The text has long since faded, but in the excitement of the moment led to a regret in that I did not take a photo to at least attempt to decipher the text. I handed my phone to my friend and she snapped the beautiful photo below also in the same graveyard, a short walk away is the grave of constitution signer Charles Pinckney.
Now I had been calling the Charleston churches for months trying to get an answer on when the graveyard would be open again, when the repairs would be finished, and so on. As I am driving from the beach to downtown Charleston, I get a feeling about the day. "This is the day," I say, "I can feel it." My friend looks at me in question and asks how I know. I can't explain it. I had a feeling that I would get into that one elusive graveyard today.
We pull up into the city and start walking around. We see the old buildings, the markets, and carriage tours pass us by as we enjoy the cool October breeze mixed with hot Southern sun. The city is fresh from the recent rain. It was about 9 am, but as the morning faded, the sun grew hotter and Charleston returned to the way many people have known it. This was the third time I had been to Charleston, so I was beginning to know the city pretty well. After a few wrong turns, past the outdoor markets, and a cut through a parking lot, I see the top of the church gates. A few steps closer and I see the same infamous sign and : Graveyard closed for repairs. NO! I ran around the perimeter, thinking, hoping, that one gate might be open. After grabbing the fence poles in feigned, yet dramatic, agony, I felt like the Eric Andre meme where he shouts "LET ME IN!" and then shakes the fence gates.
I pulled up the church number on my phone and called. For the first time in a long time, I got a human instead of an automatic message! She told me the eastern cemetery was closed because part of the church building that borders the graveyard was old and had stucco and roof tiles falling off. They didn't want pedestrians in the stucco-attack zone should one happen to come down. While the west graveyard across the street would remain open, the east graveyard would be closed indeterminably until the repairs could be made. She suggested coming back at a future time. But I had done exactly that- come back so many future times. And after what was in reality 2 and half years- I had been disappointed today. So much for my feeling.
At that moment, we see a man in a blue shirt walk through the graveyard and then into a little side door. I away from the graveyard and around the side of the building until I find I door. I literally paced back and forth outside wondering if I should interrupt some church person's day for the sake of entertaining what some might see as a juvenile adventure, but my friends affirms me in my quest, and we ring the buzzer. Through the door, we can see a woman sitting at a desk, likely the church administrator. I do not know if she saw us or not, but she definitely didn't stand up to get the door. Just as we were contemplating buzzing a second time, a priest with a young girls in tow walks out of the building. We are able to slip in behind him. He did turn around, asking us if we needed help, at looking at us like we were two people in a weird place at a weird time (to be fair, I worked at a church and if we had a stranger show up on a weekday morning, I also would have given them the same look.) We walk up to the administrator behind the desk and ask about the graveyard. She seems confused at first then realizes that I am the one who called her on the phone a few minutes previous. Her eyes seem to size me up and down as she thinks. After what seemed like an eternity, she smiled and said "Let me call the sexton for you."
Sure enough, blue shirt guy returns, desk lady gives us a map, and we are whisked away down a hallway full of church offices and through a side door, emerging out into the graveyard. We spoke with the sexton, each explaining a bit about each others' lives, blindly feeling at those invisible strings that brought the three of us together alone in this graveyard on a warm Thursday morning. He had the gait and firmness of a man who had worked among the dirt and the dead for ten years. I tried carefully to balance my overwhelming excitement and nonchalance, to make apparent the great appreciation I had for this personal graveyard tour but not seem like a crazy person who was obsessed with the dead. As if having read my thoughts, he looked back at me while we were walking. "I have to deal with a lot of crazies here." Many people sneak in at night, to come hang out, take photos, or do more nefarious things. My friend later noted that my balance between fanatic and normal found myself right at the cusp of 'perfectly passionate.' A short walk brought us to the unassuming grave of Edward Rutledge. The text has long since faded, but in the excitement of the moment led to a regret in that I did not take a photo to at least attempt to decipher the text. I handed my phone to my friend and she snapped the beautiful photo below also in the same graveyard, a short walk away is the grave of constitution signer Charles Pinckney.