IF YOU

IF YOU’RE HAPPY AND YOU KNOW IT, INSTALL A HANDRAIL

I recently received a letter from my Homeowner’s Insurance Policy. The letter started out: "Thank you for allowing us to provide your Homeowner’s Policy Insurance."

How sweet, I thought! They just wanted to tell me how much they love me!

I read on: "We are sorry that we cannot continue this insurance. Therefore, your policy is being canceled."

How quickly they fall out of love.

I continued reading, and found the egregious violation that had led to my policy cancellation: lack of a handrail on my rear steps.

Yes, on our list of national concerns, right up there with terrorist attacks and biochemical warfare comes Mike not having a handrail on his rear steps.

I began to boil into a rage, and started loudly proclaiming how incredibly ridiculous this was, and how I would not stand for this and how we as Americans should band together and fight for our freedom and went on and on until my wife kindly pointed out that neither she nor my young daughter were the ones who had cancelled the policy, so perhaps my energy could be directed elsewhere.

I picked up the phone and called my insurance company, ready to give them a piece of my mind. After all, they were the ones who had agreed to give me the policy in the first place. Couldn’t they have told me their passion for handrails then?

When I got through to the woman who handled our account, she explained to me that this was not their decision, but an underwriter’s. "Hmmm," I said, not wanting to let her know that I, like most of America, did not technically know what an underwriter was, or why he was concerned with my handrail.

She told me that the "notice of cancellation" actually gave me a month to solve the problem and avoid the cancellation. Perhaps they should mention that in the letter. Anywho, I asked her exactly what I needed to do. "Uh, install a handrail." Gotcha.

When I got off the phone, I began to get defensive and a little more ticked at the whole thing. The woman at the insurance place had been very nice and helpful, but the whole thing just rubbed me the wrong way, and I began to get agitated. I informed my wife that I flat out refused to buckle to their pressure and install a handrail on my back steps. Obviously, previous owners of the house lived without handrails, so why was I being subjected to the oppressive overlord of an insurance company? The consumer must speak!

Just as I began to run through the house screaming, "ATTICA!!! ATTICA!!!" my wife stood in path and said, "Just put up the railing. How hard can it be?"

With that edict soundly handed down, I set off to install a handrail on our back steps, despite the fact that I think the entire rule is ridiculous and clearly pointing us towards a communist country, or at least one where people can’t walk down stairs without a handrail. I could have a 24-hour drunken knife throwing act going on in my back yard, and my insurance company wouldn’t care so long as there was a handrail.

And never mind the fact that I didn’t want a handrail. It’s not like it’s that many steps. It’s five brick steps that lead out a back door into my backyard, which, oh by the way, is surrounded by a privacy fence. Anyone who is going down those steps needs to be coming from inside, which generally means I have asked them in, which always means they have signed the standard waiver of rights form that all visitors to my house must sign. They wouldn’t have a leg to stand on (never mind the fact that, if they were to fall, not having a leg to stand on might actually be their complaint).

But, it was not worth the trouble of having to go and find a new insurance company. (Read: Not going to win the argument with my wife.) I went to a home improvement store to see what was available in a nice wrought iron look. Turns out, something right up my alley – ready made iron railing. They should have the slogan, "Just add insurance cancellation!"

I got the parts I needed and, just as advertised, installed it with very little effort, mainly because I got someone else to install it for me. I now had my railing up and running, so I should be able to keep my homeowner’s insurance. A rep from the local office came out and took pictures of the railing to send to the underwriter as proof. Not sure why we couldn’t have just gone to someone else’s house and taken a picture of a railing, since the underwriter has apparently never seen my house and never will. Unless he comes to one of the knife throwing shows.