Four times this spring and summer I found myself on South
Tryon, south of Tyvola. Having grown up in south Charlotte, it wasn’t an
unfamiliar area but one corner kept drawing, and has always drawn my eyes. The
7000 block is home to a plot of land that houses a fairly large pet cemetery.
Drawing on some vague memory from my college years when my 23-year old Bassett
Hound finally crossed ‘The Rainbow Bridge’, I began to grow curious about the
cemetery, as the sign for it is now overgrown by the bushes around it, and the
single shed-like structure in the center appears to be abandoned. Oddly enough
though, the rest of it has been kept up. The lawn is always mowed and the rest
of the bushes trimmed. I began to develop an overgrown sense of Nancy Drewitis
and it finally got so bad that I grabbed my magnifying glass, cranked up my
Mustang (which I don’t actually own), dyed my hair Titian-red, and did what
Nancy Drew always did: I opened my web browser and “Googled it”.
But it took me three months to solve the mystery. Nancy Drew
would have been so embarrassed. I could find no record of the Charlotte pet
cemetery on South Tryon. Any reference to a pet cemetery in Charlotte always
listed a Huntersville location. I asked a general question of my friends on
Facebook. While there were some “likes” (that I still don’t understand because
no one seemed to know what I was talking about), I got nowhere. All I wanted to
know was who owned it, if it was still being used, what was its name, if my dog
was buried there, like I was pretty sure was the case, and if so, where. In
fact, the ONLY internet reference to that property was a very vague note in the
Charlotte City Council minutes from the late 1970’s, mentioning it as an
incidental thing to consider in a re-zoning discussion (if you suffer from
insomnia, read back issues of City council notes). Other than that, there was
nothing.
Google Earth Street View (I was beginning to feel like a
stalker) got me as far as being able to see that from April 2007 until October
2011, the bushes around the sign on the street were still being trimmed… but the
close-up picture wasn’t clear enough to show me the name of the place, so I
finally got irritated enough to stop there one day. I pulled into the driveway,
got out, walked past the creepy red shed (broken windows and all), and examined
various graves, hoping to see the name “Popcorn Eddy” jump out at me from the
rows. The latest grave I found was from 2012, so I counted that amongst my
clues.
As a last resort, I “Googled”, “How to tell who owns a
certain property”. And then I felt stupid because there were two obvious answers
that “Wikihow” gave and I should have thought of: First, write the address a
letter asking who owns it and see if you get a reply. I was fairly sure that
any reply I’d get in return from a pet cemetery wasn’t one I truly wanted. But
the second obvious answer was the light bulb I needed. “Death and taxes and even
better if they go together.” So my next search was for the most recent property
tax bill for that address. After two days of manually clicking through 800+
pages of the property taxes of South Tryon, I hit the jackpot. I just didn’t know
it at first. The block of 7001 South Tryon through 7135 appeared to be all the
same property. This was promising, yet confusing, because the name of the
business that paid the taxes had nothing to do with a pet cemetery. “Terry’s
Kennels” had paid the taxes on the property each year as far back as I could
see. I’m a bit slow sometimes, so it took me just a bit to realize that there
was a commonality here. My last step was to do a search for Terry’s Kennels and
lo and behold… what should they also own, but the Charlotte Pet Cemetery in
Huntersville. Was it really as simple as the South Tryon property being
basically used up and hence, a new plot of land was needed to continue to lay
to rest the beloved pets of Charlotte?
If ONLY I could put such whole-hearted devotion into my
search for Christ. The fanaticism with which I searched like crazy and annoyed
everyone around me with my obsessive quest to find the mystery behind this pet
cemetery that existed in my mind, in front of my eyes and on Google Earth (and
hence, it HAD to exist, right?) is sorely lacking when it comes to seeking out
a relationship with Him. And worse, HE isn’t hiding in the internet, waiting to
be found in an endless search through records and text books or by asking a
question of the all-knowing Facebook. He’s right there, larger than life,
always right in front of our eyes, waiting for us to turn our attentions His
way… even knocking at OUR door, not leaving it up to US to go seek HIM.
Evangelical tracks love to use Revelation 3:20 to get new members into the body
of Christ, and that may be all well and good but if I’m not mistaken… John was
talking to a segment of the CHURCH itself! These were people who should already
have known and sought Him but would often times toss Him aside for other
pursuits – just as we very easily do today. Can I seek Him with that
whole-hearted devotion I have for mysteries of the past? Will I open the door
to His knocking? It won’t even require opening up a browser and yet it’s often
harder to do and something I struggle with daily, often as I’m in the middle of
other things. Maybe it’s just time to find the door. I rejoice that He’s
waiting on the other side.
(By the way… a simple text to my mother and brother informed
me that my memory is already going. Popcorn was not, in fact, laid to rest in the
mysterious pet cemetery. Where I remembered that from… will remain a mystery.)
Heather Eddy is the Assistant Director of Christian Education
here at Sardis. When she is not working with the Sardis children’s
programs or assisting the Fellowship Committee, she spends time teaching
Anatomy and Physiology to pre-Nursing college students and CPR to anyone who
cares to know it, traveling around the country with her roommate and best
friend Michelle, and attempting to train her cats.
