Plant No Grass On My Grave

I was out to a Line Church graveyard recently and saw several grave sites with a lack of grass covering it. This practice use to be more common years ago but there are a few graves still left like this. The site is usually covered in white sand or gravel, edged, and some descendant of the family pluck weeds and grass out of the gravel or spread weed killer. In a more modern world members of the families do not stay in the area where they were born so there is no one around to do the maintenance on such a grave site. I remember someone I worked with telling me his mother asked that no grass be planted on her grave so each week he would go out and pull grass and weeds from it. Since he is dead now I don't know who does it. Let's face it this is only going to done for about two generations after the last person known to your memory is buried there.

Now there are also ghost stories concerning graves such as this, but I think the real reason is, it is just a decoration, much like the way people use to have a swept yard (no grass, just sand and it would also be weeded and raked or actually swept with a broom) around their house. This practice may have also cropped up from the family avoiding the maintenance fee on the grave site. Most cemeteries now have perpetual maintenance included in the price of the plot but in an earlier time it was yearly charge.

I understand in other parts of USA they are going to artificial grass to avoid cutting grass.