h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Bonne Venture Cemetery – Savannah, Georgia
October 31, 2006

I’m afraid of the dark. I always have been.

I’m afraid of other things, too: Flying, driving over tall bridges, walking on the rim of canyons, climbing tall ladders, scuba diving, graveyards at night.

My parents let me go to Cub Scout functions at school ten blocks away when I was six. I ran like the wind coming home in the dark because I was sure there were things out ready to hurt me.

Mrs. Phred works with me to overcome my fears. Downtown Tampa was a little like East St. Louis at night. It’s deserted, decrepit and dark. We walked though it at 2 AM many times for exercise and thrills. Once, as we were walking in the early morning, a huge menacing figure stepped out of the darkness down by the docks. I checked to be sure my dive knife would clear the scabbard, but the man kept walking past us. The rush was like being brushed by a 12 foot hammerhead.

She has accompanied me on midnight dives in the Caribbean fifty miles from the nearest inhabited island to help me overcome my fears of darkness and things with big teeth that lurk just outside flashlight range.

Today we explore the St. Bonne Venture Cemetery in Savannah at midnight. I hope that spending time along the banks of the Savannah among the gravestones, magnolias and Spanish moss draped oaks under the light of the gibbous moon will desensitize me once and for all to my irrational fears. If all goes well, her birthday is 12:01 on November 1st. To the best of my knowledge she has never spent it in an ancient Southern graveyard.

We realize the cemetery gates will probably close at dusk so we prepare to stash the car and climb over the fences. We will take the digital camera and tripod.

At six O'clock the scattered thin pink clouds are fading fast. We have spotted a place on the river to park the car after they close and lock the ornate iron gates.

We check our equipment again.

We have two black steel "mag" flashlights. The electrical tape over the lens allows only a slit of light. I've fashioned a grappling hook from metal we picked up at Home Depot and attached knotted rope to help scale the eight foot wall.

The police should be tied up with trick-or-treaters. I doubt that they will be patrolling the graveyard perimeter.

We are wearing long-sleeve black T-shirts, black denim jeans, thin black leather gloves and black sneakers. We have two burnt wine bottle corks to apply to our faces just before we go over the wall.

I'm taking only the digital camera and tripod to record tonight's events. Mrs. Phred wanted to take the Glocks, but I figure what we come up against, if anything, will not be impressed with our nine millimeter lead projectiles.

We go over the wall about 11:30 PM. I want a picture of the Birdgirl statue in the moonlight at midnight so we do that first.

The City of Savannah defines cemetery structures to include, but not be limited to, monuments, markers, headstones, corner markers, gates, fences, walls, coping, cradles, slabs, ledgers, statues, benches, vases fountains, bird baths, flagpoles, signs, fountains, trash receptacles, crypts, mausolea, columbaria, buildings, and any hardscape constructed or placed within a cemetery. .Mausolea are large stately tombs or a buildings housing such a tomb or several tombs. Columbaria are vaults with niches for urns containing ashes of the dead.

We decide to wait at the old Mercer family section so we make our way past the orderly columns of Spanish-American war veterans. The Mercer mausoleum is is an imposing structure. We set up the tripod and camera on the east of the building to be in its moonshadow in the darkest spot we can find. We get a few good shots of the graveyard and moss covered oaks in the moonlight.

We wait for minutes and midnight arrives uneventfully. Then we see three dark figures quietly move across the grounds. We hear a door open, and then silence.

I signal to Mrs. Phred. We have dive signals that come in handy. I hold my fingers to my lips for silence. I point at her and to my eyes as a signal to be watchful and make walking motions with two fingers.

We move around to the front of the Mercer mausoleum and find the open door. I click on my flashlight and allow a sliver of light into the interior. A section of wall stands open. We move to the interior and look into an opening leading to dark stairs. There is a dim light reflecting from deep underground.

We look at each other and I point to the stairs and make the walking signal. She shakes her head "NO" and makes a pulls on my sleeve as a signal to leave. She has big eyes. I point at her and then the ground to signal “wait here” and begin to descend the stairway.

A small electric camping light is at the bottom of the stairs. Tunnels lead in three directions. What appears to be coffin material has been used to shore up the walls and ceilings.

I bend over and begin to walk down the northern tunnel. Bodies in various states of decay litter the tunnel floor. Pieces of some are missing. I pick up a human femur that appears to have gnawed teeth marks.

The tunnel branches several times. Suddenly everything went black.

When I cam to I found myself tied securely. Three men stood over me.

“It’s awake”, said the toothless one. He reaches in his pocket for dentures. I notice the teeth are filed to points.

“What you doin’ down here, boy asked the bearded one.

“Been a long time since we had a fresh-un.” The third man cackles.

“That ‘balming fluid sure ruins the taste”. The toothless man now grins with pointed teeth.

I’m beginning to get a bad feeling about this as they all draw knives and start to bend toward me.

Six shots ring out rapid-fire and the men yelp and disappear into the tunnels. Mrs. Phred has smuggled her Glock on the trip after all. She’s never been much of a shot. After she unties me we run down the tunnel and up the stairs.

We close the wall behind us and I ask for the Glock but she’s dropped it.

“You never listen to me!” she says.

I pile about a thousand pounds of tombstones against the door and we grab the camera and head for the wall.

As we drop to the ground, the flashlights come on and I hear, “On the ground, a**hole.” We explain we are doing research for H2G2…I show them my "official post reporter" press card. They tell me I can explain it to the judge.

All I know is those three ghouls have probably dug themselves out by now...I just left a Post Office box on the arrest records, and we're not going back for the trial.

Here are the pictures from the Savannah graveyard h2g2 research.

http://community.webshots.com/slideshow?ID=555293035

One thing is really odd...the lady in the long dress in the moonlight was not there when I took the pictures...?????

Your photo of the bird girl has the quality of a tintype -- these are wonderful shots. And the sculpture of the seated woman is enough to make one reconsider one's decision to be cremated.

Good story, too.

Several of the cemeteries here won't let you have upright markers anymore. When my dad died I was upset because we were forced to select a flat marker for him. That was one reason I had F cremated and took him home with me. I rather like having him, but it does uspet some people.

There are thousands of years of oriental tradition in favor of you having F at home with you.

Having F. home with you, Hyp, upsets some people? Consider who those people are. At the risk of sounding trite: "Different strokes for different folks".

Your house, your bookcase, your F.

Our cemetery has not banned upright monuments yet. The man who does the mowing is hard on all of them--even the flat ones!

Hmmm. Does the cemetery groundskeeper gig pay well?...

Probably not here, X. The guy who does it is somewhat of a nit wit, IMO.

"Earth: expensive, elite graveyard to the galaxy. Ravaged 10,000 years earlier by war, Earth was reclaimed by its space-dwelling offspring as a planet of landscaping and tombstones. None of them fully human, Fletcher, Cynthia, and Elmer journey through this dead world, discovering human traits and undertaking a quest to rebuild a human world on Earth." -- from

http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/s/clifford-d-simak/cemetery-world.htm

Wow! Someone besides me has heard of Simak. It's been years and years since I've read Cemetery World. Wasn't Elmer a robot? And wasn't that the one with the compositor?

It's been so long, all I remember is the basic premise of the story...but Simak has a good style.

I ~adored~ his book Way Station.

Yep, Way Station was my favorite Simak story.

Way Station won the Hugo. I also remember City, A Heritage of Stars, A Choice of Gods and one set in the stone age but can't recall the title. Then there were some good pastoral short stories.

Was it a golden age of S-F or was it the fact that I was in my impressionable years, that the writings of the late fifties through the early sixties seem like some of the best ever done? My mother was a charter member of the science fiction book club (she had a ticket to the moon!), and books by Simak and Poul Andersen and Mark Clifton (When They Come From Space) and Van Vogt and Heinlein (who later fell in my estimation) littered the house. I loved the genre and was always at mom's elbow when the new books arrived.

Alfred Bester's The Stars My Destination seemed absolutely revolutionary.

There have been a lot of superb books written since then, but at the same time the genre seems to be cluttered with repetitive sword-and-sorcery stuff, or hardware porn.

I'm with you, Lil.

I was a library rat through school and somewhat beyond, living in the SciFi section. My bedroom walls featured 30+ shelf-feet of paperbacks.

Which reminds me......I think I'll pull my head out long enough to mail you a package.

You too, Hyp.

I confess that I have not read much of the printed page lately. My eyes don't have the stamina they once had. The experience becomes dyslexic.

I got hooked on SciFi as a kid. Like Lil, it was SciFi I read, not fantasy. And I do think it was a golden age for me personally for no other reason than that it was fresh. When you reach our age and the subsequent thousands upon thousands of books we've read, it is natural to become somewhat disappointed when picking up a novel only to discover recycled plots and shallow characters strung together with bailing wire and chewing gum.

I dislike modern sword and sorcery fantasy. My teens eat it up, though. The fantasy novels circulate on about a 3-1 ratio over proper science fiction.

I also read every mystery I could get my hands on when I was a kid. The classic whodunits. I still prefer them to the blockbuster suspense blood and gore offerings we get today. So, at least personally, my early reading habits still influence what I enjoy now.

I started with the Nancy Drew mysteries and still love a good mystery. One of my favorite authors is Tony Hillerman. He combines a good mystery with Native American folklore.
When I want to read a mystery that doesn't take much effort, I turn to Janet Evanovich. She's a quick read. I love the Grandmother character in her books!!

Oooooh!! Shivers running up and down my spine. Now I definitely will not be able to sleep tonight.

Extraordinary pictures. But you see, I believe everything that you write about!!. Like that mansion that you bought!!

Gullible.
Trusting.
And frankly scared stiff!!

CME

Believe me. It all happened exactly as I imagined.

hangs head sheepishly.

I have no imagination!.

I just believe everything.

CEM