Everyone here today has come to celebrate the life one amazing woman. A woman who with just the mention of her name evokes so many memories and stories, as well as numerous songs and jingles. It’s a privilege to call this remarkable teacher, counselor, partner, foster parent, grandmother and friend, Mary Ellen, my mother.

Mom was the youngest of four children. She was the only girl, with three older brothers. Mom used to tell us how her brothers would let her play with them only if she didn’t complain about the rough housing. Mom was a great swimmer, and that was a good thing, since she claims one of the favorite summer pastimes of her brothers was to throw her into the deep end of the pool. Once, when she hurt her arm, her brothers made her promise not to tell. The next morning, when Mom woke up, it was quite swollen. Grandma rushed her to the hospital to find it had been broken.

My mom, like her mother, loved to sing. Not opera. Not anything up on the stage. But short little ditties or pieces of songs. And I never knew, until I was an adult, which ones were songs she made up on the spur of the minute, and which ones were ones she knew from other sources. Or, as I used to say, in my naivete, which were real and which were made up. Because, if you think about it, they were all real. For example, I can remember dragging myself out of bed in the morning, to be greeted with, “Good morning, Mary Sunshine. How did you wake so soon? You scared the little birds away and shined away the moon.”

But that’s part of the problem of presenting this to you now. So many songs were spur of the moment and never heard again. One of my regrets now is that I wasn’t sitting with a tape recorder, or paper, or something, to record everything she said. Because her songs always made people smile.

Mom did write down one poem herself. I can still remember it:
Somewhere there’s someone for me,
Who understands my need to be free.
The freedom to do and yet care.
The freedom to love everywhere.

Years later, she would meet Maureen Mackey, who would be that someone.

Mom would also come up with the most outrageous ways of threatening us to do something. She’d say “If you stay in the bathtub until all of the water’s gone, you’ll go down the drain”, and if you dare to tell a lie, “God will come down and punch you in the nose.” I can still see that white fist coming out of the clouds. When we stuck our tongue out, she’d say, “Be careful doing that. It means, ‘kiss me quick and don’t slobber.’”

Mom’s Dad was a pilot. His career caused them to move a lot during her childhood, from Anchorage, Alaska, to Bogota, Colombia. Mom once told me that moving so often was hard. But she found that joining the school band helped her fit in. Yes, Mom was in the band. She played drums!

Mom learned Spanish while living in Colombia. She also had her first exposure to the glaring differences between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’. While in that country, Mom’s family lived in a neighborhood populated by embassies and oil company executives. There were poor beggars that would come to their door, looking for food. Grandma would always make sure they cooked extra so that there was food to hand out to them.

During Columbia’s 1948 presidential campaign, the popular liberal candidate, Jorge Gaitan was assassinated. This began a period of violent unrest and the family was forced to make a quick departure, leaving most of their belongings behind.

I tried to ask mom about her childhood several times. She lived so many exotic places, but almost never talked about them. I think that’s maybe because they weren’t as adventurous as I always thought they might be. Once, when I asked her about living during the revolution in Columbia, the first thing she could remember was dead bodies in the streets… And filling the bathtubs with water because the rebels were threatening to poison the water supply… And crouching down in the house as the bullets flies overhead and tiles fell off the walls… And just being scared all of the time.

When Mom’s family returned to the States, they spent the summer staying at a friend’s lake house in Maine, then returned to be with family in Illinois. They started to rebuild their lives in New Mexico, where Mom finished high school at Loretta Heights. At the time, Mom considered becoming a nun. She never took her vows, but changed career paths to nursing… another helping field. But, rather than becoming a nurse, she had me. So rather than helping others, she was now had kids to help.

I was the first of seven children born in less than nine years. There were so many of us, by today’s standards, but Mom always found time to read with us, play games, or spend time outside. She stayed in shape by religiously exercising with Jack LaLanne after each pregnancy. Mom ran track in High School, and could outrun all of us. I thought by the time I was a young adult I’d be able to run faster than her, but it never happened.

We moved to Las Vegas in 1962, when our dad got a job at the Nevada Test Site. We brought with us three Cuban foster children, escapees from Castro’s regime. At the time, there were 4 siblings, so already Mom had 7 children.

When the landlord found out how many children we had, he moved to evict us, assuming we were damaging the house. But we hadn’t. We had actually fixed it up, making it better than when we had moved in. When the landlord apologized and asked us to move back, Mom said no. She told him, “Keep that in mind next time you pre-judge a large family.”

Our next house was in the perfect family neighborhood, near Charleston and Decatur. During the day, someone was always having ladies over for coffee, while their backyard filled with rambunctious kids. We had Essex Circle park down the street, a library annex across Decatur and I could walk to school. The neighborhood was great for Mom. It was a social place and so was she. But, as our family continued to grow, Dad decided we needed a bigger house, and the only way we could afford it was if we built ourselves.

In 1965, we moved north of Las Vegas to a plot of land near Tule Springs/Floyd Lamb State park. At the time, there were three families within a one-mile radius of us. We were in the middle of nowhere, with dirt roads that washed out with the rain, and a mile-long walk to the bus stop. The contrast between all those people, to this barren land was a shock to Mom. But, she never complained and did what she could to bring us into town, or have friends out to visit.

Our school bus brought in children from Indian Springs, Cold Creek and Mt. Charleston, to elementary, junior and high school. Because of this arrangement, Barbie, Peggy and I, who were in elementary school, would arrive at school an hour early. The school wouldn’t let us inside, so we stayed outside the door for an hour each morning. Remember, these were the days when girls always wore dresses. And, during the winter, we were freezing! So one day, Mom sent us to school in pants. The school called our home, telling Mom that it was inappropriate. Mom told them that her girls weren’t going to freeze. I can still remember the assembly they had for all the girls in school explaining that pants would be allowed only if we wore them under a dress or skirt.

Mom always stood up for us. She was never afraid to say what she thought was right.

With no immediate neighbors, Mom soon became friends with nearly all the residents of the sparsely populated region between Tule Springs Park and the Gilcrease Ranch. We’d met Bill Gilcrease through a common friend, and he introduced us to his brother Ted and their mother. We knew them for just a short time before Elda Gilcrease died in early 1968 Just seven months later, our house burned down and we lost everything. These two shy brothers offered to let us stay with them while we rebuilt.

Life with the Gilcrease brothers, two bachelors who grew up isolated from most of society, worked because of Mom. She always made sure they were at ease. She always remembered it was their home we were staying in, and she was always grateful for the help they gave us. They were trying to figure out how they were going to pay all of the inheritance taxes, and we were trying figure out how we’d be able to recover. You’d think this would make for tense times. But, in fact, they were some of the best times…. Nights were spent watching TV, or reading books, or playing games (Dad taught Uncle Ted to play chess) or shelling nuts (so one of us could make their favorite dessert- Date Nut Bread). And, because Mom was who she was, the Gilcreases became part of our family.

Mom taught by example, but she also taught by songs, rhymes, anecdotes, and old sayings. “Give me a hug” taught me that we are a hugging family. “Good morning” taught me to great every day with optimism. “You have to love people the way that they are and not the way they are not, even if they change” taught me unconditional love and patience.

Its a great tragedy that the world has lost a woman who did so much kindness. However, the greater tragedy would be if we forget to pay forward the kindnesses that have been charitably given to us by a woman whose life was a miracle.