The Toys on the Tree

This grubby wet soft toy made me shed a tear today.

I had been out of the office for a meeting and on my way back I passed the Glasgow Necropolis, an ancient graveyard next to Glasgow Cathedral. A great blip opportunity I thought, so I popped in.

This disheveled looking soft toy was hanging on a tree just inside the gates of the Necropolis. In fact, There were quite few children's toys and trinkets hanging on the branches of the tree. Even a white baby's dummy.

The tree was beside a couple of park benches and a small gavestone on which an inscription read: "I will not forget you...I have held you in the palm of my hand. - Isaiah 49:15."

The gravestone was surrounded by more babies toys and trinkets.

The tree, gravestone and another tree with toys hanging in it nearby are a memorial to all babies and children who have died and their parents who are trying to find the strength to carry on. It's a quiet place where bereaved parents can go and hang one of their baby's toys as a mark of respect and remembrance and, I suppose, to make sure that the world knew that their baby once existed and played a small part in the on going story of mankind.

I went on to take quite alot of photographs of quite spectacular looking gravestones and memorials, but this image was by far the strongest and stirred the most emotions within me when reviewed the images later on.

The toy itself was very wet due to the horrific weather and also quite dirty, but it still wore its bright wide smile. As a parent to two beautiful boys, I know how much joy and pleasure such a soft toy can bring to a baby or child and I also know just how much pleasure a parent can feel deep inside when they see their baby or child having so much fun and connecting with their favourite toy.

However I cannot even begin to imagine the sheer heartache and anguish that the parents who have visited this place to hang their baby's toys must be feeling inside.

Life is a beautiful experience and should be cherished, but it can also be incredibly cruel. We all lose loved ones, I recently lost my lovely Dad, but to lose a child who hasn't had the chance to experience the wonderful things life has to offer is the cruelest thing.

I can't imagine how the parents who once sat and watched as their baby played, giggled and gurgled with this soft toy can sleep at night, let alone find the strength to get out of bed in the morning to face the world. But I hope that they can and one day will come to terms with what's happened and go on with their life in the best way possible and find happiness and a degree of contentment wherever they can.

I think that when life gets abit too much for me in future and juggling work, two kids, money and all the other stresses of life start to get me down I'm going to pop up to the Necropolis again and look at the toys on the tree.

That will put things into perspective again.