Looking for Ancestors and Promoting My Book (In Reverse Order)

Well, I took a copy of my new book "What We Leave Behind" (which hasn't cracked Amazon's top 100 books yet; I'm waiting....) to this independent book store in Oak Park.  I won't name names in case I sell a book there.  The person I gave my book to (on consignment) was a little on the "independent bookstore" side (i.e., there may have been tattoos and mustaches involved, no pornstache, but I was distracted by the mayhem/clutter inside).  He had told me I could bring one---only ONE---signed copy in for consignment:  a 60/40 split.  I'm still not sure if I get 60% or 40% if my one book sells.  I guess I should look at the consignment form I signed.  He didn't even ask me the price. I believe this is because I asked him, "If this book sells, do I bring you more copies or do you just order them from Amazon?"  He witheringly said, "Well, that would be like Burger King placing an order for hamburger supplies from McDonald's".  "Oh, right....." I said as I was "hitting myself" (that is an OINB reference for my sisters).  OK, there is no way someone can find my ONE book in this store.  I can see no sense of organization here.  It was so cluttered it made Half-Price Books look like the Oak Brook Barnes & Noble. I'm pretty sure he threw my book away when he walked towards the back of the store when I left.  To get to where my car was parked a block away:  a quarter for 15 minutes, after the stupid meter ate my first two quarters and then flashed "Failed".  I hope this isn't some sort of premonition.....

I'm on a learning curve here with promoting my book.  So far, I'm on the downslope I think.  Except for my amazing cousins/publicists on Facebook.

Afterwards, I stopped at the nearby River Forest Whole Foods.  I needed my signature organic cottage cheese I like and now I forget the brand.  It starts with an "S".  I think.  I just look for the green and white container.   I forgot to bring a cooler bag and didn't want to buy another one there for $8.99 seeing as I already lost 75 cents parking.  So I bought four cheap waters from the fridge case to lay on top of the cottage cheese to keep it cool in the paper bag (because, yet again, I forgot one of my myriad reusable grocery bags; I may have the biggest collection in the Chicago metropolitan area.)  I mention this because my next plan, on the spur of the moment, was to visit Grandma Sullivan and Great-Grandma Ellensohn.  I realized I was only about 5 miles from Queen of Heaven/Mt. Carmel Cemeteries in Hillside. So I thought I would show their graves my book about them.  I still had two in my car since, as I mentioned, the Oak Park store only wanted one copy.  They had no room for more than one copy (in their dumpster in the back I believe).

First of all, Queen of Heaven is huge as is Mt. Carmel right across the street.  I think the street it is across from is Wolf Road or Roosevelt.  I was so turned around.  I do know that as I was traveling west on Roosevelt there were two other huge cemeteries.  There are a LOT of dead people in Hillside, Illinois.  The lady at the desk of Queen of Heaven found Grandma Sullivan's plot site and Great-Grandma Ellensohn's plot site (hers was at Mt. Carmel) and helpfully gave me maps and a red dot where to find the graves.

I have no sense of direction.  At one point, I was walking around the correct sections studying the map and using the compass on my iPhone to find north.  I would get SO lost on the Appalachian Trail.  Thank god I scrapped that idea.

I finally found Grandma Sullivan's section where she is buried next to Grandpa Sullivan.  Dolores moved them together whether Grandma Sullivan wanted eternal rest or not!  But I couldn't find the grave.  I did find a very nice Mexican gravedigger in the adjacent section and asked if he could help me.  The sun was beating down fiercely and I was wearing a long-sleeved shirt and sleeveless nylon vest and getting exhausted.  The nice gravedigger said he had to finish digging a small baby grave (ok, now you just gave me "a sad" inside, mister).  Then he kindly found the headstones after studying my map.  I tried to give him a tip but he refused; actually he gave me a tip: he told me to lock my car which was right nearby and to watch my purse. Apparently, this Catholic cemetery is full of crooks and thieves.  That's not what Jesus would do, you crooks and thieves out there, don't ya know?  I took a couple of pictures, then I took a picture of Grandma's grave with my book so she would be happy, then blew her a kiss as I walked to my car.  

Next stop:  Mt. Carmel.  I did a whole tour of Queen of Heaven trying to find my way out to get to Mt. Carmel across the street.  I even read the Exit sign wrong.  The arrow was very ambiguous in my opinion.  I finally found a bunch of people gathered to start a funeral procession near an entrance/exit.  Of course I went the wrong way on Roosevelt and did a totally-against-the-law U-turn back and entered Mt. Carmel.  I kind of had no problem finding Great-Grandma Ellensohn's grave.  I think she somehow GPS'd it to me personally.  There is one gravestone for both her and Pa/John Ellensohn.  I swept the grass cuttings away and took another picture to show them both my book, and put a little hand kiss on their grave and thanked them for having all of us ancestors.  They said you're welcome I'm pretty sure.  Or, maybe they were thanking me from heaven for sweeping away the detritus covering their gravestone.

At least I got to have a moment with my grandmas and my book, all three of us together......and the thousands of other people in Queen of Heaven and Mt. Carmel.  

The cemetery map lady also gave me the section where little Alois and Marie Elizabeth were buried together (and Muttie according to the best knowledge I was able to gather on this matter), but she kind of looked at me with a "good luck with finding that".  I found the section, but no grave.  I must have swept off at least 50 gravestones looking where the map seemed to show it should be.  I think it must have gotten overgrown.  I did find a Soprano gravestone for someone named Soprano who hadn't died yet---I guess this Soprano was prepared for a whacking.  A number of graves are at least now legible thanks to my hand sweeping of the stones. Half-way through this "Looking for Alois/Marie/Muttie" ordeal, I was SO dehydrated and HOT, and there was no one else around so I went near my car and stripped off my long sleeved shirt (I did have a sports bra on so I didn't look like a cemetery pervert, just maybe like a cemetery runner) and put my sleeveless nylon vest back on.  Boy, did that feel cooler.  Drank some water I had in the car and tried once more but never did find that grave.  So I wished them well....wherever they are.  Hopefully not under that Soprano grave site.

My sandals and toes were covered in dead grass and my hands were filthy from wiping off old gravestones.  By the time I found my way out of Mt. Carmel (another directional challenge), I swore that if anyone in my family dies on my watch, they are not being buried in any cemetery.  They are being cremated so I can carry them around with me.  I'll have some cremains made into jewelry....They do that, you know.  And then future ancestors don't have to look for gravestones under a hot sun being dehydrated.  Dad later told me on the phone that he and Mom have their sites already paid for and they are under a tree and we could have a picnic....they bought these so long ago I think they paid $200 each for them and they are worth much more by now but the cemetery (it might be Queen of Heaven) won't buy them back for more than what they paid and by God, Dad is not going to let the cemetery get that profit!  Well, I told him no thanks on the whole picnic thing---- I'm wearing him and Mom and that's final!

I had to GPS myself to go the right way on Wolf Road to go south toward Ogden and then home to LaGrange (all tired and sweaty).  Of course, I started out north.  While I waited to make a turn so I could get my car going south, ironically I had to wait for a funeral procession to go by.  One with 200 or 1,000 cars.  It could have been less.  I was so sure my cottage cheese had curdled.  When I got home, though, it was still cool enough not to poison me, phew!  I'm already on thin ice with the eight little cheeses which I like for lunch (two per day) as they expired yesterday and I'm chancing it with eating them this week.  If the cheeses kill me, don't put me in Queen of Heaven or Mt. Carmel.  I want to be jewelry.