Friday, October 29, 2010

A 10-Year old Problem revisited

It is a very cold 24° here this morning.

We are now living on a very 'citified' country road.
From October 2010

I am hoping the bright paints fade somewhat soon. It seems strange to look out and see that in front of the house.

Yesterday was errand day.

I have great plans to paint the master bathroom a sage green. I am very tired of the grayish white color that has been there for years. I will use the same green that is on the bead board paneling on the back porch. I know I like it already.
I also want to put a fresh coat on the guest bathroom floor. This bathroom has really cheap square tiles in a pinkish cast that I stuck down quickly when we moved in just to clean up what was there. I read about painting linoleum floors and did it and it worked great. This has been down for several years now and just has a chip here and there. I finished it with clear poly. I wanted to use the same color that is down, a nice brown, woody color. I found the two cans of remaining paint that showed the custom numbers, brought it down to the house and set it right by the back door to take to the store to get more paint.

We also needed to buy chicken leg quarters for the dog at W-M, buy a calf collar at the farm supply store, get more books at the library and then home.

Just as we started in Lowe's I realized I hadn't brought the paint cans with me; I walked right past them on the porch floor by the door! Blast. So we turned around and went to W-M where we picked up very few things.

At the last minute I stopped in Hobby Lobby for some fabric. I am determined to do some sewing again. Fabric is not cheap! Things have changed since I quit sewing. I did pick up some for an apron, drawstring pants and a tunic top. We will see how that goes..............

Found the one collar for the calf that was in the entire store....red. Today we will give that a try. I need to contain Willow's calf while milking her.

Did the library and came home to fix lunch....leftover chili over hot dogs on whole wheat bread, a sort of casual coney.

Phone rang:

An issue from 10 years ago was just waiting for me to pick up that phone.

There is an old family cemetery on the farm. It has never been cared for; cattle and at one time hogs were allowed access. There were a few old stones knocked about. The previous owner of our farm had lived here for 50 years. She said no one from the family had ever shown any interest in the cemetery at all.

Well, lucky us. A local lady, elderly began calling me about how she was doing her family genealogy and wanted to show some relatives the cemetery. We were running the dairy at that time and had Holstein heifers in that field. They were separated from the cemetery end with a hot wire (not wire, but a fiber on an expensive reel that was strung across the field. I agreed and when they pulled up in a huge car and expressed that they would like to drive back to the cemetery (a car load of elderly people) I told her about the heifers and the hot wire.
The end of the story is they drove right through the wire, scared the heifers into another field. We had to round them up. We didn't find that reel of polywire for several years and found it laying in the grass when brush hogging one year.

The lady began calling me regularly wanting to put a stone in the cemetery. I finally put her off by telling her we couldn't do it until we quit milking.

She called me often for two or three years. She even bought the stone after collecting money from other relatives all the while me telling her no.....she had the monument company call me at one point. I told them the story; they quit calling and finally she did too.

The issue at hand is in the state of Missouri once you allow family members to set a stone and/or fence the cemetery, you are required by law to allow access to anyone. If this land were near the road, it would be no problem but it is not! Visitors have to prearrange a visit, the time must be daylight and they have to only come when you tell them it is convenient. Problem most people wouldn't even know where it was without a guided tour......second, we are using that field for cattle, including bulls. I have no idea but I suspect if we approved the visit and left cattle in the field, knowing they were coming we would be legally liable if they were injured. Also what about old people stepping in a hole and falling....I do not intend to have to hire a lawyer to see about all this.

I don't want to me mean and appreciate them wanting to commemorate this burial site (even after 150 years!)but I don't want to complicate our lives either.

The final straw was yesterday's phone call. It was from a member of Greene Co. Historical Society. The elderly (90's) lady had called her numerous times hinting that it was her responsibility to force us to do this....history of the county, etc. She turned out to be a neighbor's 80 year old sister who does volunteer work. I told her the entire story and she said it was entirely up to us. No law forces us to do this since there is no exception on our deed about this cemetery. It is listed in the county cemeteries as a 30 x 40 foot space.
She seemed very sympathetic to the problem but offered no advice. DH want to ignore the entire issue.

I am leaning toward letting them set the stone if I don't have to have any interaction with the woman again. It will be a flat stone. My worry is if a 2000 lb bull steps on it.......it could become more history! I am hoping that once it is set, that will be the end of it....I know her two daughters aren't interested; they have never stepped foot on our farm that I know of. They could have been in that car, but I doubt it. I don't think we will be inundated with family lookers. I hate that the monument company has had that blasted thing stored for 10 years! Somehow I feel guilty. I am sure they all hate us over this. We are still considered outsiders having just lived here since 1976. If your relatives aren't buried in the local cemeteries you are "new" people.

I will try to resolve this today and hope that I don't regret my decision.

I told the woman who called that I would not maintain the cemetery nor spend any money for this at all. The society has previously laid a stone on a nearby farm in a grove of trees to mark a Revolutionary War veteran's resting place (a guessed location) and it was not fenced and was just ignored, but was there. I am hoping this will turn out to be the same.

Keep your fingers crossed for me. See, living in the country isn't always a bed of roses!

6 comments:

  1. You are probably right to just let them set the stone, with the understanding that you cannot be responsible for upkeep or care of the cemetary. She is just feeling guilty for waiting so long to even care and you are right on that her daughters prob. will never set foot in that cemetary. No "right or wrong" here, just a problem that's hard to solve. When it's private property the rules change but she seems oblivious to laws. On a lighter note the pie was delicious last night...thanks so much for that great pie crust recipe!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Oh Glenda, what a pickle of a predicament. I don't envy you living in the country right now. :-)

    What did you have before they paved the road? The lines should fade somewhat over time.

    Have a great weekend ~ FlowerLady

    ReplyDelete
  3. We have visited some of those cemeteries that are in the middle of someone's farm. We're always very careful not to disturb anything, and we never go there without the owner of the property present. I just think that's the sensible thing. We go to their house, they put us in their vehicle and take us out there. It takes a little of their time, but well worth it to safeguard your property and livestock. The old farmer in Edna, KS, told us we could come any time, just remember to close the gates. But I would never go there without him. We went twice, the second time we brought Hubs' elderly sister who wanted to see the graves. Have not been there since and I think the old farmer died. His son had the adjacent property and probably took the place over.

    I had understood that if you have a cemetery on your property you are forced to give people access to it if they have an ancestor buried there, but that may be Oklahoma law or it may be only something someone made up.

    Hubs' ancestors lived in Greene County and also in Christian and Lawrence County. Hubs has some distant family members in the Blubaum Cemetery a.k.a. Jones cemetery near Billings. I've never been to that cemetery but ancestors of the brother of Hubs' great-grandfather carried one of those Civil War monuments all the way across a field to set it there. They said it was quite a trip.

    I hope it all works out for you. But I sure wouldn't let them go out there without me, and I wouldn't let them take their car. Hugs...

    ReplyDelete
  4. My goodnes, you have had quite a day! Hope things work out for you on the cemetery situation.

    Good luck on your sewing. I haven't done any for a long time except for mending, etc. Fabric, along with everything else, is expensive. I sewed for both my girls when they were young but not as they got older except for dresses when they were in weddings. Made a few things for myself but never liked the fit, etc. so quit!

    We had leftover chili and a burger for lunch today-love chili and soups/stew with cornbread during the winter or anytime really.

    ReplyDelete
  5. That is one problem I wouldn't know how to handle. It sounds like this woman is bull headed and I would tend to think that once the stone was set she would think she had the right to visit anytime she pleased. That first experience with them driving through the hot wire would have turned me against it.

    Thanks for stopping by my blog. I'm now a follower of yours.

    For the fleece insoles, You could use a piece of heavy cardboard between the two layers to keep them from moving around. I don't use anything, just straightem them before I slip my foot in.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I hate to say it but I think Granny J is right...this woman is going to think she's got a right to visit whenever she wants and I wouldn't be up for the possible liability and headaches over that. Maybe it's wrong of me but I wouldn't do it.

    As for sewing...I find that with the cost of fabric it's just not worthwhile unless I'm mending or using fabric/clothes I find at yard sales. I considered sewing my own diaper bag so I could get it just how I wanted it--but even with Hobby Lobby having all the patterns on sale for $1.99, the cost of the fabric would have been as much as buying a really nice designer bag! Not worth it to me. Sad too, since sewing can be so fun...I'm just not up for an expensive hobby like that.

    ReplyDelete