I bagged out of work early yesterday and, spur of the moment, decided to walk home. It was lovely autumn day, sunny and pretty warm too. I found myself heading east on Irving Park Road. When I got to Clark I realized I was at the entrance to Wunder’s Cemetery. It was Halloween. So I went through the gate and walked around. It was very peaceful. I saw a few cars driving through and two bicyclists riding around but I was the only walker. Judging from the names on the gravestones it’s largely Germans and Hispanics buried there. A lot of the headstones though have been worn away from time and you can’t make out the name anymore. 

The ground was thick with fallen leaves. It was quiet. I tried to imagine what some of the people had been like when they were alive, tried to imagine what a funeral circa 1907 would have been like. So banal, but once upon a time they were alive. And then they weren’t. What would it be like to actually have a funeral on October 31st?

The south end of the cemetery has a chain-link fence running around it; on the other side of the fence is Jewish Graceland Cemetery. 

I walked the rest of the way to lakeview and at the video store I had the good luck to rent The Wolf Man. Andy and I watched it, after ordering out from Oodles of Noodles and consuming martinis. We both had a rotten day at work. 

Laurie Anderson:

What Fassbinder film is it?
The one-armed man walks into a flower shop
And says: What flower expresses
Days go by
And they just keep going by endlessly
Pulling you Into the future
Days go by
Endlessly
Endlessly pulling you
Into the future?
And the florist says: White Lily.