No longer a need to beware of falling flowers in mausoleums
A few weeks back, Donna Zoda brought flowers to the mausoleum crypts of her parents and her son. This is something she’s been doing, in one form or another, for the past 30 years at Our Lady of Lourdes Cemetery in Trenton.
You can then imagine her surprise when she was told she couldn’t leave the flowers she brought, but that she could instead purchase a (at minimum) $200 vase that would be attached to the front of the crypt to hold the flowers.
That’s right: She had to purchase a special vase in order to display the flowers.
At first glance it would appear that even in death the cost of living continues to rise as greedy corporations look for new and inventive ways to remove money from the pockets of those of us left behind.
Well … it’s worse than that. “Our insurer was concerned about the fact people were leaving flowers around the perimeter and in the middle of our mausoleum,” said Sandy Miller, the director of the cemetery. “So at one point in the past we switched to putting out pedestals for people to put their flowers on. But then the insurer became very concerned about the pedestals.”
You know where this is going, right?
“In this day and age of ‘get hurt and sue’ we had to come up with a different model,” Miller said. “And the model we came up with would eliminate the risk of someone falling.”
Welcome to America, 2017, where the risk of falling flowers is causing grieving family members to cough up a few extra Benjamins so flowers can be displayed.
To be clear: It’s not like Our
Welcome to America, 2017, where the risk of falling flowers is causing grieving family members to cough up a few extra Benjamins so flowers can be displayed.
Lady of Lourdes invented the crypt flowers vases. They’re a thing. Many, if not most, mausoleums use them. But to have to use them because of insurance reasons? That’s insanity.
“If one of those pedestals fell on you the worst that would happen to you is a black and blue mark on your shin,” Zoda guessed. “It couldn’t weigh more than 15 pounds. There’s no way you could be injured by this thing unless you were 107 and already laying on the ground.”
Well, those 107-year-olds are notorious for frivolous lawsuits and …
Miller’s staff sent out a letter detailing the change in policy last December, and Zoda clearly didn’t get it (or read it; if she’s anything like me, mail goes from mailbox to dining room table to a pile somewhere else. Sorry bill collectors!).
“I’m very sorry this happened to her,” Miller said.
For her part, Zoda left the flowers she brought, nevermind the fact she realizes they were probably discarded soon after.
Miller did tell me they do make a small profit on the sale of vases — it is a business, after all — but that she’s willing to work with any family that is having any sort of financial hardship.
In Zoda’s case, it’s not that. It’s just that she can’t believe after 30 years of being able to leave flowers for her son and her parents, she now can’t without forking over the dough.
“I’m not a cheap person, but come on,” she said, which sounds about right.
Because really: Come on. This is where we’re at? Knee-high pedestals causing insurance companies to quake in their wingtips? To use the parlance of our times, there’s only one word and one punctuation mark that sums up this situation: Sad!