Two days ago I received some appalling news---that the Jal Cooper Cemetery had been vandalized. The image that immediately sprang to my mind was that of a headstone or two defaced with graffiti from a spray paint can. Would that were the case!

The extent and severity of the damage and destruction boggles the mind. For a detailed report, see Rhonda Watson's article and the information from Brian Norwood posted on this website's NEWS page. Basically, about sixty headstones were toppled and numerous flower urns broken.

I have no relatives buried there, unless I include as relatives the extended family of
late Jalite friends and neighbors who have surrounded me since my childhood--and I tend to do just that. Images of certain people pop into my head. Emma Davis--residing in my earliest memories, a large woman with an even larger heart, always kind, always caring. Earl Goedeke--pioneer rancher and father of my good friend and classmate, Judy Goedeke. Judy and I started first-grade together, so I first knew Earl a long time ago. Richard Phillips--my good friend and mentor, and fellow trumpet player. Countless times Richard and I played 'echo taps' at Cooper during funerals and on memorial day celebrations, until finally I played it by myself, without the echo,
at Richard's own Cooper funeral when his all-too-young life was extinguished.
I vowed at that time that if I could just manage to 'make it through', I would never
play that wretched piece again, and I never have. These three, and many more, are
all residents of both Cooper and my memory banks, and all are in some sense loved-ones.

This 'violation' of deceased loved ones is completely inexcusable. What kind of mindless, non-thinking animal does something like this? Although I ask that question, I'm really not interested in the answer anymore. I'm tired of the explanations---"he suffered abuse as a child"---"he was drunk or high and therefore not responsible for
his actions"---"society has caused him to harbor a great deal of pent-up rage".
Who cares?  I don't......not anymore.

Perpetrators of such criminal acts should have to suffer the consequences of those acts, not be excused by psychological explanations. Do I sound like a conservative Republican? I'm actually a very liberal Democrat, but this atrocity has touched a nerve
and unleashed a torrent of retribution I didn't know was inside me. Etiquette forbids
my saying what I think should be done to the ignorant, cowardly culprits if they are
apprehended. Trouble is, they probably won't be. They picked an easy target for their devastation, a place in the middle of nowhere with no security. And yes, they probably were drunk, laughing, and in their minds having fun--which makes it all the more reprehensible.

In trashing the cemetery they also trashed our minds, our thoughts, and our memories of loved ones. For this, there is no satisfactory explanation and no forgiveness.

I plan to visit Cooper during the reunion, just to see who-all is there and to call up some long-lost memories. Many Jalites, including my family, have chosen interment in Kermit and their reasons are understandable. However, I think all their reasons can be summed up in one---the Kermit cemetery has grass. Personally, I've always preferred Cooper and have always delighted in causing my mother constant exasperation by my insistence that I would be buried there, and not in Kermit with the rest of the family.

First of all, I adamantly refuse to be laid to rest in Texas. My mother will tell you that
I was born in Kermit, but that's something that I have obstinately denied all my life.
I'm a New Mexican, and no piddling little detail like a birth certificate is going to change that. Second, I absolutely love the desert, (I don't need grass) and the Cooper landscape suits me just fine. It's home. For the past twenty years I've lived in Tulsa, OK, and I can't begin to tell you how tired I get of all the 'green'. My favorite time of year here is winter; when the trees are bare and the grass is the color of straw I'm reminded of New Mexico. Anyway, the Kermit-Cooper argument is no longer relevant, as I now plan on cremation.

However, the fact remains that Cooper is the final resting place of many, many friends--both mine and yours--and what has happened there is devastatingly sad.
I can only hope that justice will be served.