“How romantic,” their children often said. “Grave artifacts and a match made in tragedy.” Their grandson, David, now college age, had joked that his dad talked about how depressing they were all through his childhood, that maybe there should be a dating site called Morbidity Match, and Frank had laughed along; it was clever—what else can you do? But he would dare them all to find the kind of glue he and Lil had because of it all.

When they first met, they had both felt so alone with their grief. There wasn’t an internet or therapy sessions about anything. A lot of people didn’t even talk about anything emotional. And, no, Lil was not who he would have picked out at first glance around a dance hall, but in no time, he found a sense of comfort he had not even known he was missing, and she said she felt that way, too.

She worked at Filene’s then, and her dream was to open a dance school. Frank was in graduate school. At one time, he had wanted to be a minister, but he feared his beliefs changed too often to fit into that role. He did believe and he wanted to believe. But he also thought that surely a great power who knows everything would also know you had doubts and sometimes were faking it. Still, for the most part, he did believe, and he thought of that Captain Midnight badge he found there in a heap of steel and ash and scorched earth, a sign, a miracle of a message to remind him that there is something out there; there is a greater power.

“It’s why you’re interested in history and religion,” Lil had said on an early date. He could tell she was annoyed when he put ketchup on his mashed potatoes, but big deal, because he found her looks to be bland, her lips bare of color. “She’s nice,” people said about her. Nice. The necessary word when trying to convince others of someone’s worth. But then they had stumbled on all they had in common, and the many times they might have been in the same places at the same time.

“So tell me about yourself,” she had said, her hair tucked behind one ear, a beige scarf wrapped around her neck and fastened there with a little pin—an ivory Scottie dog with little rhinestone eyes, something he later learned had belonged to her mother.

How romantic. A match made in tragedy.

Yes, sixty-five years. And, yes, lots of digging and searching, for both of them, and both literally and figuratively. Burial practices became a focus of his, the beliefs and rituals in preparation for the afterlife. He was especially drawn to the graves of children, that premature closure, some ancient graves containing a keepsake, a toy to take along into the next life.