Courtesy of Becky Mushko

Becky Mushko, a Franklin County writer, said she bought her own tombstone two years ago as a Christmas present to herself.

The people who took Becky Mushko's tombstone out of her family's cemetery this weekend might be surprised to learn that she very much wants it back.

"I won't rest in peace until it's returned," Mushko wrote Monday morning on her blog.

The blog entry wasn't a demand from beyond the grave. Nor is Mushko, a Franklin County writer sometimes known to use the tongue-in-cheek pseudonym Ida B. Peevish, creating a hoax. Two years ago, she purchased her own tombstone, and over the past weekend both the marker and the stone base plate it rested on disappeared, apparently wheeled away in a cart through the cemetery's front gate.

Mushko, 62, bought the stone, engraved with her name and birth date, as a Christmas present for herself -- though it should be noted she also bought herself a puppy.

"I don't have kids or siblings, so I figured I should take care of getting a marker that suits me while I'm still alive," she wrote in an e-mail, adding, "My husband has lousy taste. If he survived me, goodness knows what he'd choose."

She bought the stone at a discount special for $575. "I liked the idea that I could pick out a design I liked. I wanted to enjoy it while I was still around," she wrote. "I always thought it was kind of cool to visit my own grave in my own cemetery."

That cemetery lies at the corner of her family farm on Standiford Road in Union Hall. Mushko's husband, John, noticed nothing amiss when tending to the farm Saturday morning, but when he returned Monday, he noticed the marker missing and immediately called police.

Franklin County Sheriff's Deputy J.R. Hodges said he has dealt with several incidents where tombstones have been pushed or knocked over, "but never with somebody actually taking the whole thing."

Anyone with information can call the Franklin County Sheriff's Office at 483-3000 or the Roanoke Valley Crime Line at 344-8500.

On the Net: peevishpen.blogspot.com/