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As houses and churches morphed over the last century to all look the same, our graves did too.

Before mass production made headstones the same, the graveyards looked like town parks where tall, short, thin, squat amblers had just stopped where they stood. Each one a unique individual of unique sizes, shapes and colors. You feel invited to stroll among them and converse, maybe with a parasol and a top hat on, like in an impressionist painting.

Now, though, we make graveyards of row upon row of square, shiny grey boxes which grid the grass into suburbs for the laid dead. No reason to stroll. You see everything interesting from your car window as you pass.

So you go from your square house, in some shade of beige or grey, to your square grey grave, marked with a monument that’s any size of square, any shade of beige you’d like.