I have a bumper sticker on my car that says “Ask Me About My Book!” It hasn’t been on my car that long, and today as I was driving around on several errands, two people asked me about my book. The topic is of course, funeral planning for those who don’t plan to die.
A woman inquired about my book while I was walking across the Whole Foods parking lot. When I told her what it was about, she sighed and said, “I wish my parents would make some plans. They really don’t want to address that issue.”
My advice to her was to lead by example. If she makes funeral plans for herself and shares those plans with her folks, perhaps her parents would be a bit more amenable to making some plans of their own.
This was the case with my husband and his parents. We told his folks that we were going shopping for burial plots in our synagogue’s cemetery and asked if they’d like to go along. Since we were doing it, the visit provided an easy entry for them to address the issue as well. They looked, they liked, they bought. Now my father-in-law rests in a lovely spot, and we’re all glad it was arranged several years before he died.
If you have recalcitrant parents when it comes to funeral planning, think about leading by example to break the ice.