Thoughts from Connie

on the occasion of her mother's memorial service

July 17, 1999-Bowdoin College Chapel

As many of you know, Mother was experiencing the deteriorating effects of dementia.

I want to speak to you of the gifts I felt this disease brought to our family.

While many tend to look with sadness upon changes that come in the course of our lives, my
orientation is to look at the beauty, to ascertain how the loving nature of things is working its
magic upon our hearts and spirits.

As what we consider to be the crucial aspects of our personality fell away with the loss of her
memory, mother moved into a state of being that was innocent, childlike endearing, funny and
adventuresome. Without the trappings of the mind, she came into the present. Aspects of her
personality came to the fore that had been hidden behind the armor that protects our hearts and
allows us to fit into a way of life that we see as appropriate and good, but which perhaps does not
serve us at deep levels.

Instead of mourning the loss of what had been, her family, each in their own way, moved into
new roles, new ways of being and thinking that would never have been considered without the
impetus of a dramatic, life-threatening disease.

Her condition demanded that we move out of a fast-paced life and become patient, loving
nurturers-very present and very conscious each of her waking moments.

We came home to Maine where mother's life came in full circle after being away for so many
years. We spent time with the people who meant so much to her, and to whom she meant so
much. Our social calendar was full visiting and being visited by friends and family. It meant so
much to her to feel loved and connected. When she left the dining room at the Highlands on the
stretcher she waved goodbye to Happy Aldred, one of her mother's best friends who had seen my
grandmother Connie through her last days and who had eaten dinner with us that night, and
whose presence had meaning for Mother we can only guess at.

And so I honor the circumstances that gave me so much heart-centered quality time with my
mother and I am thankful for the way her life on Earth ended, with the beauty and dignity that
she embodied as a model of graciousness, service and kindness.

Thank you for coming today and thank you for the love you have given our family over the past
50-80 years.