I'm now in Florida, admittedly not very far into Florida, but I'm already asking, Where's the sun? Where's the warm? It's chilly and cloudy with a low of about 20 tonight. I'll keep heading south and west until I can't go any further on land and it had better be warm and sunny. I don't know what I'll do if it's not, but it had better be.

Yesterday was my last day working at Andersonville. The two months flew like the wind but in that brief time I learned more about the Civil War than in all my time in school. This morning I finished a book called Junius and Albert's Adventures in the Confederacy by Peter Carlson, a nonfiction account of two New York reporters who were captured by the Confederacy and held for 19 months in Southern prisons, most notably Salisbury Prison, North Carolina. Salisbury was brutal even by Andersonville standards. It's an easy read, mostly reconstructed from their correspondence, but what I liked best about it was how it brought the war down from the Generals, big battles, death rates, and chronicles of disease to the people who lived in it and through it: those who participated in the Underground Railroad not only to help slaves escape north but also to protect Unionists, Confederate deserters, Union soldiers who came home to the south on furlough, and New York reporters who wanted to go home.

But I digress.

While at Andersonville I found myself collecting tombstones. I've been accused of having "all these hobbies" and he was probably right, but I've enjoyed them all, including my fascination with cemeteries. While wandering the rows in the cemetery I started noting the different faiths represented at the top of most markers, birth and death dates, wars participated in, and what I call tombstone sayings. Families apparently have a designated number of spaces and lines in which to record something about their loved one. Lots and lots say things like BELOVED WIFE MOTHER AND NANA (punctuation not allowed). I don't plan to be planted but rather scattered so there won't be anything said about me that won't be carried on the wind, but I'd still like to think my kids or I could come up with something more original and on the far end of the sassy spectrum. One note, before I show a sample of the tombstones I've "collected," and I don't mean disrespect, but in the thousands of grave markers I walked among, not one said, HE WAS AN SOB.

So here are some that struck my heart or piqued my interest, leaving me with questions that likely will never be answered. I will apologize in advance for the funky spacing of the photos. It took me more time to try to place these in some kind of order than it did to take the photos and process them. Thanks, Blogger, for making it hard.