Spirits in the Rain

I wish I would have had more time to spend in Lisbon. It was one of those crazy trips that you throw together on the fly, and I am so glad that I went - but I can't wait to get back for a longer stretch. Oddly, or not so oddly if you know me, one of the best parts of the trip was a very wet and windswept couple of hours that I spent in a cemetery that I stumbled across at the end of the trolley line. The entire cemetery was filled with fascinating mausoleums, a couple of which were broken in to (or at least in the midst of serious and clumsy repair). I still think in the one picture looking into the mausoleum you can see a ghost, but maybe I'm the only one who can see it. There is something soothing about walking around a cemetery. Lord knows I spent hours of my time in graduate school loafing around Spring Grove Cemetery in Cincinnati, often bringing books there to read. Even now when I head back to Cincinnati every spring for my fantasy baseball draft Dave and I always head out to Spring Grove for a long walk (made longer by the fact that we lose the car every time). I really like a couple of these pictures (along with the picture of the yellow roses from the same cemetery that I posted last week). The statue featuring the death mask is really creepy, and the mask, with water running down it, looks like it is ready to talk or spray mist. Mary and the flowers is also quite beautiful, and, stealing a line from Simple Men, "she's also the mother of God."