Cemetery theft really hurts

Talk about it

To the Editor:

On May 25, my husband and I visited our daughter’s grave site at Hillside Cemetery in Carlton. On May 26, it was five years ago that our daughter died and our hearts were forever broken. My husband picked out and adorned her grave site with a hanging wind catcher with a butterfly on it and a stone solar butterfly ornament. Butterflies remind us of the free spirit our daughter had and the freedom her soul now has to this harsh world we sometimes live in. We left on a family vacation and returned to visit her grave site again on June 3. The butterfly ornaments were both gone. We were not shocked, but saddened, as things have been stolen from her grave site before as well as other grave sites at this cemetery.

I try and find the good in this world and believe most people are trustworthy and do not want to harm others. I ponder though on what type of person steals mementoes from a grave site? Especially on a memorial holiday when so many are remembering loved ones. A lonely and sad soul this person must be and someone who has no respect for human suffering or the sacredness of a human’s grave.

If the person who took these items reads this, I ask you to return them to my daughter’s grave. Think about not the material items you took but the memory of the person they were left for.

On a positive note, I would like to thank the city of Carlton and the workers who care for the Hillside Cemetery. The cemetery always looks especially nice on Memorial weekend and is kept well maintained during the summer months. Thank you.

Roxane Schmitz, Carlton

Tags: letters to the editor, opinion, carlton