Jack Kerouac has been for long time one of my favourite authors. Years ago, I loved to read his books over and over again: On the Road, The Dharma Bums, Desolation’s Angels, Big Sur… His books were pure inspiration to me as I always found his writings close to my personality, close to my feelings, close to my deepest thoughts. For this reason, today I've decided to have a detour (but it’s better saying a death tour…) to visit his grave in Lowell, an industrial town one hour by train North of Boston. The anonymous grave of the “Father of Beat Generation” lies in a big English-like cemetery, lost in decay among other thousands stones. His worldwide fame during life wasn’t enough to escape him from the misery of death. The employer at the cemetery didn’t even know he was buried there together with his wife. Nothing else but the words carved upon his stone remembering us that “He honoured life”, few cigarettes brought as offering by someone else, one small papier-mache bird and one Halloween pumpkin. Nothing else, nobody else but me.
Standing there in a chilly grey November day, among the falling leaves of New England's colorful autumn, has been my own tribute to a great writer, a good person, a friend I never met.
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