My Dad Loved Roses

Richard Jones Parish
1922-2009

Private Richard Parish, WWII
Radar Repair in Army Signal Corps

Graveside services for Richard Parish, WWII veteran, will be held at Ft. Logan National Cemetery (approximately corner of Hamden and Sheridan in Denver) on Thursday, Jan. 19, 11 a.m.  We will meet at Staging Area A at 10:30.  At 10:45 the Army Honor Guard will lead us in cars to the grave site, where my Dad's ashes will be interred.  The army chaplain will lead the team in the service.  Pastor Amos from our church has said he will be present and say a few words.  There will be a gun salute.  The service will be brief, probably less than a half an hour.  I anticipate we'll go out to lunch afterwards.   My Mom and brothers are not able to come. 

Dorothy and Richard Parish

Yesterday Jesse and I went to Crackpots and glazed the urn, which will be fired on Sunday.  I hope it will come out well--I haven't glazed a pot since the seventh grade.  It has a rose on one side and a cross on the opposite.  While I was painting I was very conscious of the sunny afternoon in May when I helped my Dad plant a rose garden for my Mom for Mother's Day in our yard in Muscatine, Iowa.  Many birthdays I gave him a new rose bush for his yard in Pittsburgh, Pa until he told me that even though his yard was big, he was full up on roses.

My Dad was a good man.  I'll feel better when his ashes are buried.  There will be a place for my Mom's ashes when that time comes.  For veterans, the military provides a free cemetery plot and service.  As long as there is a US government, their grave will be cared for.  Jesse has promised to come with me every year to decorate the stone with roses.