Dear Liza,
Out on a walk the other day, Auntie Bridgett and I enjoyed the cool Fall breezes and wafting leaves.
We also got that perspective that really looking at things gives. Near the SideStreet Arts Gallery, we saw this delightfully painted mailbox. It had a sweet, almost “Dora the Explorer” feeling.
We continued through the neighborhood to pay a seasonal visit to the Dead People at Lone Fir Cemetery. I have volunteered to help with this year’s Tour of Untimely Departures, a wonderfully eerie event put on by the Friends of Lone Fir, and I am very excited about it!
At this event, groups of guests are escorted through the cemetery, and actors playing some of the dearly departed stand by their headstones to tell the story of their life and death.
On our walk, I took the map of the tours and we walked around to see if we could find the graves. First on my list was Emma Merlotin, but I couldn’t find her, but Auntie Bridgett took this picture of the headstone of Anne Jean Tingry- Le Coz because of her French origins.
When we got home, Bridgett did some research on Miss Tingry-Le Coz on the Historic Oregonian website. It turns out that SHE was Emma Merlotin, the lady on our tour who I was looking for! Emma Merlotin was the name she used when she was working here in Portland, but after she was murdered, her friends chose to bury her under her real name.
As always with friends at Lone Fir, I was sorry for her death, especially after her short, difficult life. But I was happy to have found Miss Merlotin and be able to remember her.
Life is full of contrasts, and I am glad for them.
Love,
Grandma Judy
Dear Liza 