British Cemetery Officials Won't Let Man Put Too Many Flowers on Wife's Grave

Not only are the bureaucrats stupid in England, it appears the landscaping people are not much better off. At least that's what we're led to believe.

That's because the staff at Gorstage Cemetery in Weverham, Cheshire told Stanley Brown he could not put more than one bunch of flowers on his wife's grave, because they're obstructions.

Staff told Stanley that the flowers kept the landscapers from cutting the grass, and might cause them to trip.

Good old Health and Safety. We knew you could protect us from overly sensitive displays of lifelong love.

Brown was married for 57 years, and his wife died last December. He has tended her grave four times a day, every day.

"This has really upset me and the whole family. They all live within a three-mile radius and they all want to lay flowers at Violet's grave," Stanley told The (London) Times. "If I lay flowers, and one of my children or grandchildren also want to pay their respects and lay flowers, they can't because it's against the rules.

The problems started after Brown placed £20 of roses on his wife's gave one day. The following day, he found them stuffed in a landscaper's shed. A few days later, he received a letter from the Weaverham, Cuddington and Acton Bridge cemetery committee telling him they would steal remove the flowers if he placed more than one set on her grave.

Cemetery committee chairman John Freeman sniveled to the Times, "Plot owners are only allowed room for a single set of flowers due to the layout and upkeep of the cemetery. One or two people have built gardens in front of the headstones which is what breaks the rules and doesn't hep the gardener when he is mowing. We went up last week and removed a couple of obstructions and put them in a room."

"The committee go on about the gardener cutting grass at the cemetery but it has only been cut three times in the past year," Stanley said. "My sons and my granddaughter's boyfriend help out and cut the grass from the sides of the graves."

Sounds like the cemetery might be falling down on the job, although that may have just been a bouquet of flowers.

I would think that if the Weaverham Cemetery really cared about the safety of its workers, they would hire people who were a little more sure on their feet and were not immediately waylaid anytime someone left a bouquet of flowers for their loved ones.

Seriously? Seriously, Weaverham, Cuddington and Acton Bridge cemetery? Tripping is the best you can come up with?

You don't like that people show "too many" symbols of love and care to their family, so you come up with what may possibly be the dumbest excuse in the history of dumb excuses. "Our gardeners might trip on them." Is that the best you can do?

Or do you hire morons and the severely unstable? I'm all for helping people who need a break, but honest to God, if you're going to trust people to operate machinery that will chop off a man's foot at 100 miles an hour, you need to rethink whether you hire the ones who easily stumble over a bunch of flowers.

Otherwise, leave the man's flowers alone. Keep your rules for yourselves, and try to show the same honor and dignity to the living as Stanley Brown wants to show to his wife. Or at least pretend you still have a heart.

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