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| Homecoming |
It was an open secret that Haven Church had difficulty keeping a pastor. For this reason (I suspect) they offered me a contract to be their pastor for 12 months. This is an unheard of scenario, but I believe they were attempting to influence me to stay with them for a longer time than most had stayed. I accepted their offer and moved into the parsonage that they generously offered to me.
I stayed at Haven Church for nine months before I had any inkling that something was...not right. After everyone left, around 5:30 P.M. (every Sunday evening) I noticed a blue haze or fog. It seemed to appear out of nowhere, and it generally stayed present, in varying degrees of intensity, until 5:30 in the morning. I was curious, and even more curious since the most intense display of color mostly came from the pathway that descended toward Haven Cemetery.
I consulted all the notes left by various family members, and then I purchased a 12-gauge shotgun and a small but powerful spotlight. The next morning, at 5:30, I saw the blue fog. I left the house and began to hike toward the cemetery. What I saw still haunts me.
Like my ancestor of years ago, I observed a sight out of a horror movie. Grave markers were toppled and damaged. Graves had been dug into. Pieces of coffins were above ground and appeared to be shattered. The place was a disaster area.
I returned to the house and called the sheriff's office. I waited for a patrol car to arrive. In just a few minutes one did, and I rode in the car with the deputy, back to the cemetery.
After I reported what I found to the police, the local media first broke the news to the public. Fortunately, although the Haven Cemetery lay minimally deep in the woods, it was still "off the beaten path." The news of the desecration did not attract any macabre onlookers. The only people allowed onto the grounds were the family members of those who were buried in the graveyard and local pastors.
Flashbacks
I can't get the cemetery out of my mind. It is a site where many of my friends, acquaintances, and several members of my family are buried. It had been desecrated. Gravestones were toppled.
See Part 7 here.
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