...a memorial garden on the corner of college housing...

I know nothing of fraternities and sororities and while the university where I work has Greek life, it does not have houses for such organizations. That being said, I have seen a frat house or two… and a sorority house or two. While I did not see the inside of the house, the garden was stunning and not at all what comes to mind when I consider college student housing.

I’m calling this the memorial gardens at the Kappa Kappa Gamma house at The College of William & Mary but the memorial marker reads a bit differently. I’m not certain how the Greek life connects (and I honestly don’t care) and this post is not about that.

It is very much how a garden becomes its own type of cemetery. Now if I said to the girls living in the house that they’re basically living right next to a cemetery, I’m sure that they’d be a little creeped out.  Fortunately (and by that I mean *unfortunately*), many students including those who “know the girls that live in the house” and were quickly walking through while we were gazing longingly are completely unaware (because I asked) that this is a memorial garden with no fewer than a half dozen plagues.When we pointed out a few, they seemed just as surprised as if I had said, "see those beautiful flowers." They weren't paying any attention to this special place.

This garden is on private property and we didn’t ask to enter. My fella said that the signs and memorial markers invited us. Good enough for me. There are gardeners who show great attention and care to the plants, flowers, and trees in this garden that it is a shame that the young college students seemed to show little care about it. I was happy to see that on our walk back by the garden there was an older woman sitting on one of the benches reading.

I don’t know who Gregory, Carol, Josephine, Anne or Loy were and I’m completely unfamiliar with the Berkeley Garden Club, but I agree that “a garden is a friend you can visit anytime.” It is a place where we can remember and show respect to those who came before us if only we can pause for a moment.