The Memorial Service was held at the Community Church of Chapel Hill Unitarian Universalist.
Maj-Britt Johnson (Welcome and Homily), Marion Hirsch (Eulogy)
Remembrances: Alan Cross; Yvette Sheline, Ray Sheline
Jonathan Sheline (w/ Anelle, Serge, Hans), Joan Magat
Eliana Perrin, Paula Bohr, Joshua Socolar, Choir
Prelude: Glenn Mehrbach (CCCHUU choir director), piano: “Let Justice Roll,” “Balm in Gilead,” and “All the Things You Are.”
Yvonne and Josh play “Ashokan Farewell” (violin and piano, by J. Ungar).
Maj-Britt Johnson (CCCHUU minister): (Back to top)
Welcome. We are here today to both mourn the death and to celebrate the life of Rebecca Ruth Sheline Socolar. Friends, family, coworkers of Rebecca, congregants of the Community Church, Rebecca’s fellow choir members, you are joined in this unique gathering, assembled in just this combination of people, only because Rebecca lived. You who knew her best will speak about Rebecca, about her life, her achievements, her personal qualities, her relationships. Stories will be told. Rebecca’s vibrant life will be remembered and we will rejoice in the gift of her life.
But first, I need to acknowledge as minister of this congregation, Rebecca’s church, that we also gather together because we need to name this shared loss in our midst. Loss leaves some sense of disorientation in its wake, especially for those closest to her, with whom Rebecca shared her daily life – Josh, Yvonne, and Jacob. And then there are those of you with whom she once shared her daily life and continued to share the unending ties of family. For you her extended family and for those in her other widening circles of life, her absence causes a shift. What will life be like now? How will things change now that she has gone?
This past year has been an immense journey for you, Josh, Yvonne, and Jacob, and for all of you the Sheline family and the wider Socolar family, and for her close friends, as well, who have shared with her family in that journey and have come today from all over the world, from as far as Denmark and San Fransisco. We come together, all of us, to sing and to talk, to laugh and to cry with you. There is a strength that is regained when we gather and we call on the spirit of life that is within us, amongst us, and working between us to sustain us.
So we come here. It is our instinct to do so. We fly in and we drive in and we walk in, and we gather around and say “We’re here for you “ and we want to reorient ourselves to life again. There is some great instinct for gathering and for mourning and then for rising above the mourning that we have in common with the birds. There’s a passage by the great naturalist Loren Eisely that says something about this. It’s called “The judgment of the birds.” In this passage, Eisely tells us about waking up from a nap to the presence of that bird of death, the raven, recognized in so many cultures as the harbinger of death. The raven has a nestling bird in its beak. Eisely writes:
“The sound that awoke me was the outraged cries of the nestling’s parents who flew helplessly in circles around the clearing. The sleek, black monster was indifferent to them. He gulped, wetted his beak on the dead branch a moment and sat still. Up to that point, the little tragedy had followed the usual pattern, but suddenly, out of all of that area of woodland, a soft sound of complaint began to rise. Into the glade fluttered small birds of half a dozen varieties, drawn by the anguished outcries of the tiny parents. No-one dared to attack the raven. But they cried there, in some instinctive common misery – the bereaved and the unbereaved. The glade filled with there soft rustlings and their cries. They fluttered as though to point their wings at the murderer. There was a dim, intangible ethic he had violated that they knew he was a bird of death. And he, the murderer, the black bird at the heart of life sat on there, glistening in the common light – formidable, unperturbed, unmoving, untouchable. The sighing died. It was then I saw the judgment. It was the judgment of life against death. I will never see it again so forcefully presented. I will never hear it again in notes so tragically prolonged. For in the midst of the protest, they forgot violence. There in that clearing, the crystal note of one song sparrow lifted hesitantly in the bush. And finally, after painful fluttering, another bird took the song, and then another, the song passing from one bird to another, doubtfully at first, as though some evil thing were being slowly forgotten. ‘Til suddenly they took heart and sand from many throats joyously together, as birds are known to sing. They sang because life is sweet and sunlight beautiful. They sang under the brooding shadow of the raven. In simple truth, they had forgotten the raven, for they were the singers of life and not of death.”
We here also know what to do. We gather first to let death know we’re willing to look it in the eye and we can protest its presence. But finally we transcend death by raising our voices together. We are the singers of life.
I believe Rebecca has transcended death and is now somehow one with the great mystery of life. In the fall of 1998 Rebecca took a class called “Building Your Own Theology” with the Reverend Charlie Kast here at the Community Church. In that class, she wrote this about death: “Death is simply a part of life to be accepted as best we can.” And she wrote: “Death is a mystery.” I’m grateful to Josh for lending me Rebecca’s BYOT papers to look through. It’s both beautiful and a little bit eerie to read them now, after her own death, because they are about those very core questions, and because it’s like opening a time capsule.
I want to share a little more of what she wrote with you, because in a way they set up a call and response for us today. When we take classes like Building Your Own Theology, we are calling out to each other, maybe to the universe, or God, or life itself – however we conceive that which is greater than ourselves. We are calling out “Here am I. This is who I am. This is what I believe is important.” The first thing one is asked to do in this class – I’ve also taught it many times – the first thing we are asked to do can be rather startling. We’re asked to draw a timeline with our birth at one end and our expected date of death at the other. Rebecca wrote, back there in 1998, “I anticipate that I am about halfway through my life.” She had set the end of her timeline at 2038. Though Rebecca did not make it to her hoped for date of death, when we hear from her friends and family we will hear a response to the call of her being. We’ll hear of a life fulfilled, expectations largely met.
Here is some of what Rebecca was claiming as her own in 1998. When ask to write her guiding principle she said: “Try to be helpful. Try to reduce suffering and make the world a better place. Be honest. Each person should be valued, respected, and treated with compassion. Try to remain centered and listen to inner voices.” Asked about her happiest experiences she wrote: “Being a parent. Falling in love. Being in love.” Asked who were the four people who had the greatest impact on her life, you won’t be surprised to learn that she wrote: “Mom nurtured me, raised me up. She was a model of tremendous energy and being able to get things done, a model of selflessness. Dad instilled in me a drive to do well, to push myself. Together mom and dad in me a strong sense of morality. Josh has accepted me for who I am. We have a relationship that feels so solid and that we never doubt, makes me feel special and beautiful. Him being so patient and steady has had a good influence on my life, sharing the journey of partnering.” Writing about her children, she said “Being a parent has made me grow in so many ways. It is wonderful to see the development of the kids, the better to appreciate my own parents and the issues they had at similar stages. To be depended upon as a parent is a good feeling.”
Rebecca wrote that at times she has tried, but was not able to believe in a traditional god, but rather that it is “helpful to think of an entity or a force that is greater than ourselves.” So not really the best in ourselves, but greater than ourselves. The life force which embodies universal truth. That may have changed in Rebecca over time, but to me it embodies an often shared Unitarian Universalist sensibility about what we call the spirit of life. In Hebrew, the word for “spirit” is “ruoch,” and it is the same word as “breath” or “wind.” I’d like to end my remarks with a very brief prayer, the last line of the Hebrew kaddish. I’ve revised it just a little bit to reflect Rebecca’s own, well built theology. Let us pray. Let the breath of life, which makes peace in our soul, grant peace to all of us and to all of humankind. Let us say amen.
We’re going to join in singing “It Is Well With My Soul,” which is written on the insert that you got with your order of service. Why don’t we stand – I think we sing more strongly when we stand. It is well with my soul.
Hymn (first verse only): “When peace like a river attendeth my way, when sorrows like sea billows roll, whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say “It is well, it is well with my soul.”
Good afternoon. I am Marion Hirsch, a friend of Rebecca’s, and I am very honored to have been asked by Rebecca and Josh to share a little of Rebecca’s life story. The first thing that you need to know Rebecca is that she wasn’t always called Rebecca. She started out being called Becky – Becky Sheline. What’s important about this is not so much the Becky part, but what is important is the Sheline part. Rebecca came from this amazing family, the Sheline family. She was born in 1958, the fifth child of the seven children of Ray and Yvonne Sheline. Her father, Ray, was a nuclear chemist in the Chemistry and Physics departments at Florida State University, and he started his career working on the Manhattan Project. Her mother, Yvonne, was the daughter of missionaries and had grown up in the Belgian Congo. She started out teaching in the Congo and met Ray when she was getting a masters in education. She was a remarkable person in many ways, not least because she gave birth to seven children in an incredible nine years. From her father, Becky gained a keen and analytical mind, and from her mother she gained a loving practicality and a sense that a person should not just do well, but should genuinely strive to make the world a better place. This early life shaped the person Rebecca was to become in so many ways.
The Shelines lived on a beautiful Lake Bradford in Tallahassee, and Becky grew up canoeing among the cypress trees and spectacular wildlife. It was there that Rebecca developed her love of the outdoors, the water, and the solace of nature. World travel was a hallmark of the Sheline family and was a lifelong habit of Rebecca’s. You might think a family of seven children might stick close to home. You might think that Rebecca’s mother might have been daunted by the logistics alone of feeding and wrangling seven children on the road. Far from it. Each summer, Yvonne would load up her seven children and drive across the country in her voluminous Checker cab to rendez-vous with Ray in Los Alamos, New Mexico, where the family spent their summers. And New Mexico wasn’t the only destination either. Ray’s lecturing and research took the family to Denmark, to Russia, across Europe, and Japan, and it was on these family expeditions that Becky developed her love of travel and adventure. And throughout her life, Rebecca sought opportunities to visit new places, and she especially liked to stay long enough to get to know the place. She explored all the cities she lived in with relish. Rebecca had a remarkable sense of direction and an uncanny ability to navigate. Even if she hadn’t been to a place in years, she could still find it again.
One other thing that is important to know about the Shelines is that they are all remarkably accomplished academically and professionally – not just the parents, but all the children as well. And Rebecca was no exception to this impressive family trend. She was an excellent student. She was valedictorian of her high school class in 1975 and magna cum laude graduate of Bryn Mawr in 1979 with a chemistry major. It was Rebecca’s strong desire to do something truly useful in the world and to use her strong aptitude for science that led her to medical school. After graduating from UNC Medical School in 1984, Rebecca did her residency in Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, and after practicing as a pediatrician for three years in Boston was a Fellow at the Einstein Medical College in the Bronx. And as late as 1998, Rebecca received a Masters in Public Health from UNC.
If you look at Rebecca’s CV, it’s very impressive. She was a full, tenured professor in Pediatrics and Social Medicine at UNC and there is a long list of articles, presentations, and awards. She was particularly well regarded in the area of child abuse and child protection, and it is clear from the grants that she obtained and the programs that she directed that she was a gifted administrator and most notably for many years she was the director of the Children’s Medical Evaluation Program, which is a joint effort between UNC and the state of North Carolina to provide a state network of providers to determine the presence and extent of child abuse and neglect.
But this list of accomplishments does not even begin to tell Rebecca’s story. As important as those responsibilities and achievement were to Rebecca, her primary achievement and joy was her family – Josh, Jacob, and Yvonne. Rebecca’s story more than anything is a love story. She met Josh her sophomore year in college. He was a student at Haverford which was only a twenty minute walk from Bryn Mawr. I asked Josh what it was about Rebecca that first attracted him and he smiled and thought for a moment. He said: “Her beauty.” He said: “There was something about her. She was vibrant and popular, confident, radiant, and funny, and it showed in the way she carried herself and the sparkle in her eye.” He said in retrospect he knows in great detail all her many virtues as a person, but in the beginning it was simple. He was simply drawn to her. The first night they became friends they stayed up all night talking and by daybreak Josh was trying to hold her hand but she kept pulling away. That summer their friendship blossomed into romance and by Rebecca’s senior year they were living together. From then on, more and more, their decisions involved each other and being together. Rebecca arranged to do her rotations and residency in hospitals in Philadelphia so she could be with Josh as he pursued his PhD in physics. They married in 1983, and in 1989 Jacob was born, and in 1990 Yvonne was born. Nothing was more important to Rebecca and Josh than being together and being with Jacob and Yvonne. Reading to them, traveling with them, supporting their interests and passions, and just enjoying them. What Rebecca’s CV doesn’t say is that she was very clear from the beginning that she wanted to be home with her children when her children were at home. And so her position at UNC was never a full time appointment. As Jacob and Yvonne grew and went to school, Rebecca gradually increased her work hours to seventy percent, but never more. It is a testament to her talent and drive that despite her part-time status she was made a full professor. And not only was she an example and mentor to her colleagues, but she was also willing to speak out on issues of equity when it would have been easier when it would have been easier and more comfortable to rest on her laurels. She was an advocate for herself and other women in the medical school, insisting that women be compensated equally for equal work and not be unfairly discriminated against because of gender.
Rebecca would say that the best year of her very happy life was 2001-2002, when for Josh’s sabbatical year she, Josh, Jacob and Yvonne took a trip around the world. First living in Paris and then going on to Bali and Bangkok, Australia and New Zealand, and finally ended for a summer in Santa Fe. It was being together and on an adventure that Rebecca loved most. Rebecca would say that one of the things she was most proud of is the trip she organized for her mother in December of 2006. She, Josh, Yvonne, and Jacob took Mama Yvonne back to the place of her childhood only a few months before her mother’s death. It was a gift to all of them, but especially to her mother.
As her friend, I would say Rebecca was blessed with an intuitive sense of what was important. She was also blessed with a marvelous ability to plan, organize and execute her life. Unlike many of us, she was able to make the things she thought were important happen in her family and in her work. And she knew she was blessed with enormous gifts, and instead of being vain or self-involved, she was generous because she could be – generous with her time, with her love, and her wisdom. Not only did she have time for Josh, Yvonne, and Jacob and her work. She had time for working at the shelter and Project Homestart, to call her many nieces and nephews on their birthdays, for her friend Dequine and his family, for her parents, her siblings, her colleagues, her choir; for bike rides…. Most of all, she had time to really listen to the people she loved.
I got to know Rebecca because I was in a women’s group that she started six years ago. She buttonholed me after choir one evening, asking for advice. She wanted to start a women’s group with “cool women,” as she said, to talk about life’s important questions: Why are we here? What about god? What is really important? And she said she had a vision for this group: that we would become fast friends forever; that we would be there for each other in the hard times and the times of joy. And as she said this we were standing in front of the church in the dark and I remember looking up at the stars and thinking “This is what I long for, too.” And I didn’t even know I had that longing. The company of cool women who could be true spiritual companions. And Rebecca’s vision for us came truer than I ever expected or hoped. It was such a gift to me in ways that I can’t even describe. Thanks you, Rebecca.
And let us sing together “How Great Thou Art.”
Hymn (first two verses only): “Oh Lord my God, when I in awesome wonder, consider all the worlds thy hands have made; I see the stars; I hear the rolling thunder; Thy power throughout the universe displayed. Then sings my soul, my savior God to Thee, how great thou art. When through the woods and forest glades I wander and hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees, when I look down from lofty mountain’s grandeur and hear the brook ????. . Then sings my soul, my savior God to Thee, how great thou art.”
Maj-Britt: I’d like to invite Alan Cross, Rebecca’s colleague, to come forward and speak.
I’m Alan Cross. I’ve been on the faculty at the medical school at UNC for over thirty years both in social medicine and pediatrics. I first met Becky – that’s what we called her then – in August of 1980 when she was among thirty-two first-year medical students who came to our house for dinner, my cohort of student advisees from the class of 1984. As I was wandering around the house making sure everybody’s plate was full and glasses were filled, I caught Rebecca, sitting in a corner, deep in a conversation with my eight-year-old daughter, not talking about frivolous things but discussing the important things in the life of an eight-year-old — friends, summer vacation, school, the like. As I walked by I said “Ah, there’s a future pediatrician.” As was pointed out, family was always very important to Becky. She came to me in her second year and told me that her true love was stuck in Philadelphia getting his PhD in physics and she therefore needed to do as much as possible of her third and fourth year rotations in Philadelphia. So we worked hard on that. We arranged it and I think she did almost everything there. I even arranged for her to do a rotation with my younger sister who was an intern at St. Christopher’s. And I think it was based on her success in doing this that they changed the rules and now you can’t do that anymore. But that was typical.
Family also mattered to Rebecca in her approach to child abuse and neglect, her chosen area of work in pediatrics. It was always very family-centered, aimed at encouraging families to be stronger, encouraging appropriate discipline, developing programs for affordable therapy for children and families to recover from adverse events – and not just the issue of identifying who the perpetrator is or punishing them in those situations. So a very family-centered approach, family centered also in her career that she was a role model for the balance between work and family – not exclusively for women, but for all of us to put things in their proper balance. She worked as was said, so that she could spend time with her family. She challenged at the same time the rules that said that a tenure-track faculty person could not be a part-time person. She then worked hard and rose through the ranks of the untenured track to become a Clinical Professor of Pediatrics, and then, because of the success of her career, she defied tradition and requested to be shifted over to the tenure track, which had not been done before. And this past year she was granted the rank of full, tenured Professor in Pediatrics and in Social Medicine. And now there have been others who followed in that unprecedented track, so she has blazed a trail.
Another thing that always struck me about Rebecca was her strong convictions about fairness, justice, equity. She would stand up for these principles against all odds whenever she felt the challenge, without concern about the consequences for herself or her career. Rebecca, I speak for many of our colleagues. We miss you. We miss your infectious laugh, your broad smile, your commitment to children and families, your role model to us all, your integrity, your dedication to fairness. We miss you greatly.
Maj-Britt: Yvette Sheline will speak next.
Good afternoon. Rebecca, or Becky as we always called her growing up, was my much loved little sister and my best friend. She was always the wise one and it was her perspective and understanding that I wanted to hear. As you’ve heard, she planned projects that she believed in and implemented them down to the last detail, whether that was going on a family sabbatical, getting my mother to Congo for the very last time, or starting a new child abuse project. She had a zest. She had a wry sense of humor and a raucous laugh that she would let loose when she was having one of what she called her “Becky moments.”
Now that she’s gone there’s a gaping hole in my life and yet, like the light and dark shapes in an Escher drawing, I can see more clearly what we lost, and what we had when she was present. I see more clearly the beauty of her life. I see that she lived more in her fifty years than most people who live a very long life. In this past year we’ve talked several times about how she saw her life. And she said that while her life was short, far too short, at the same time she felt truly blessed. She felt blessed because she had gotten everything important in life that she wanted – the best husband and best marriage; amazing wonderful children; special time to spend with family; vibrant, important work; and many. Many wonderful friends. We celebrate her life and we hold her close in memory.
Maj-Britt: Ray Sheline will speak next.
Ray (Rebecca’s father): (Back to top)
On January 12, I wrote a letter to Rebecca. Unfortunately she died before she got that letter, so I would like to read that letter to her at this memorial service. I wish to begin, Rebecca, by castigating the cancer which cut short your life. Be not proud, ye mindless, cancerous DNA cells and growth factor. In spite of you, Rebecca has already given herself into immortality. This is not the theological immortality that we often hear about, but is a practical immortality that we all understand and believe in. It is the kind of immortality that we gain when we pass our genes on to our children, the kind of immortality that we have because we do something good and pass it on. In fact, we get an idea of this from the movie “Pay It Forward.” So let us trace how this paying it forward occurred in Rebecca’s life. And I repeat some of the wonderful things already said.
Rebecca, your childhood was active and happy, occasionally mischievous, but mostly helpful and giving to your six siblings, your parents and your friends. Your bout with scoliosis, curvature of the spine, at fourteen, was very difficult for you, but you handled it with grace. The problem was finally solved in college with a major operation in which a Harrington rod was inserted alongside your spine and eleven vertebrae were fused. You accepted wearing a full-body cast for six months cheerfully and without bitterness. You were always bright and also very dedicated, so in spite of your scoliosis you graduated as valedictorian of your high school class.
At your college, Bryn Mawr, you met Josh Socolar, from the college next door, Haverford. The attraction was immediate, the passion incandescent, and the giving reciprocal. You completed your MD degree and a residency in pediatrics, and Josh completed his PhD in theoretical physics at the University of Pennsylvania. You finally settled in Chapel Hill, where Josh joined the physics department at Duke and you joined the medical faculty at UNC. You have two wonderful children, Jacob and Yvonne, who will be a junior and a freshman at Swarthmore this fall. The children have clearly adopted your giving, liberal values and have been actively working to promote them.
Your work at UNC in the medical school in pediatrics has led you on to the field of child abuse. You have set up groups in various parts of North Carolina to attempt to lessen or abolish child abuse. With your very outgoing, kind, giving way, you have been incredibly successful. That success has been recognized by the university by extending tenure to you, the first part-time faculty to receive tenure. You have also received a lifetime achievement award from the American Academy of Pediatrics.
In the broader sense, your giving nature has touched everyone you’ve contacted, even people you met for only a few minutes. Therefore, Rebecca, try to be not too disturbed that your life is cut short. Your almost fifty-one years is more significant that most people who have lived to be seventy, eighty, or a hundred. Your giving spirit will continuously be transmitted and transmuted a thousand, thousand times, far into the future. So gaze ahead Rebecca, with courage and confidence. The future belongs especially to you. With pride and abiding love, Dad.
Maj-Britt: Jonathan Sheline will speak.
Hello. What a tribute to Rebecca to see so many people come from all over the country and even overseas to pay their respects. When Rebecca was six in 1964 our family drove an d camped through Russia and each of us recorded our observations. Rebecca wrote “All of my family is like a angel.” She also said: “I like to help people, to get the table set, and help get lunch ready, and wash the dishes, sometimes with a little help. And I like to iron and I like to help my mommy get things ready to go on a camping trip.” In addition to being helpful, we Sheline siblings also remember how determined she was. We had a contest when she was about ten to see who could hold both heels off the ground the longest from a lying position and Rebecca easily beat all of us.
I had the privilege of spending a couple of hours with Rebecca most Thursday afternoons in the past year, and I’d like to share some of what I got to learn about my sister. The most beautiful thing for me to have witnessed were the incredibly knowing and loving looks shared between Rebecca and Josh. Their intimate connection was so obvious, even with no words spoken, as Josh would smile and anticipate Rebecca’s needs such as snacks to ward off nausea. Rebecca felt so fortunate to have Josh. She told me he is such an incredible human being. Rebecca was never one to brag, but as she talked with me about Josh recently and how much more confident and gracious he has become over the years, she thought her unconditional love for him probably helped, and it was reciprocal of course. I’ve also learned just how courageous my sister was. Those of you from this church probably remember that Rebecca was here in church on January 11, just two days before she died. She had decided she wanted to come in for the Martin Luther King service at which Josh played a beautiful piano piece and she just simply willed her body to cooperate. It brought tears to my eyes to see Rebecca slowly marching in on her own power and sit through the entire service despite considerable pain. My gosh what courage.
Rebecca was someone who simply did what needed to be done without making any drama or fuss about it. She was so thoughtful and diligent about keeping up communication with friends, sending thank-you notes, corresponding by email around the world, including with my daughter in Egypt just three days before she died. I would like to share with you some comments by various family members who can’t all speak here today.
From Annelle, that’s my daughter: Six thousand miles away, I have the luxury of numbness. I can remain here in defiant denial trying to think you to life. My memories of you are inextricably bound up in memories of those for whom your absence is least deniable because to think of you, Rebecca, is to think of Josh and Jacob and Yvonne. To recall your treasured bike rides is to evoke images of Duke Forest, Jacob rising at four a.m. to go birding, the four of us kids sledding after an rare heavy snow, all eight of us walking through the trees to New Hope Creek. To hear the echo of your joyous laugh is to remember a meal at your round table with the eight of us. Sam has said something funny and we’re all laughing, though no-one can match you in volume or mirth. The table is spread. Pink stuff fills our glasses, the salad dressed with Jacob’s special recipe, and real cream will be whipped for dessert, a treat we never get at home. To summon up your singing is to hear Josh playing. To listen as Yvonne’s voice changed from a talented youngster to a trained vocalist. Instruments were our toys. No childhood visit to the Socolar house was complete without a round of music making with the African drums and tambourines that still cluster in the niche by the fireplace. No Sheline family reunion was complete without a sing along, which she would goad sometimes reluctant cousins into by telling us to do it for Yaya – that’s the Kikongo name for our mother. Last reunion we sang in Yaya’s memory. This year we’ll sing to honor both of you. To me you are still singing, as you were when I last saw you. Entering your house for dinner on a chilly night in Novermber, I found the four of you together, Josh and Jacob playing the piano, you and Yvonne singing. I want to hear the rest of your song, Rebecca. You have been cut off in the middle of a verse and I want to know how it ends. We who love you will try our best to carry on without you, but your beautiful voice was always audible in a group. To sing now without you is almost too painful. And so as you listen now to a gathering in North Carolina or to a little voice in Cairo, I hope you hear singing, and I hope you join in.
From Serge Socolar: The first time I met Rebecca I immediately hoped that she and Josh would get married. Among her many attributes, to me Rebecca had a special way of filling any place she lived with a profound sense of home and family. From the apartment near Zabar’s in New York to the apartment in Philly that was barely large enough to get in the front door without hitting the back wall of the living room, to Ossining and the house in North Carolina, Rebecca made everyplace a welcome and caring, thoughtful and nurturing home. She and Josh have always given each other, Jacob, and Yvonne infinite trust, support, and love, and it will always show through Jacob and Yvonne’s special qualities and in so many other wonderful ways.
From Hans Sheline: Ruby has always helped others in many practical ways, helping with the dishes as a four-year-old, cheering me up when I needed it while growing up, remembering to send birthday and holiday wishes every time for decades, helping reduce child abuse for many. Rebecca inspires me and many others to try and follow in her footsteps. One of the many things I learned from Becky was the courage to do the things that needed to be done and not to waste time doing them. Becky lived more and did more in her fifty-one years that most of us do in a lifetime. She has inspired me even now to start acting on my life’s bucket list faster and more courageously than ever. While it breaks my heart to have to say goodbye to Becky, Ruby lives on in a very real way, not only to me, but in all of you and all of the people she touched so meaningfully in her fifty-one years with us. In a profound way, Rebecca has achieved some measure of immortality in a way that the rest of us can aspire to. Godspeed, Becky. You have my love always.
Rebecca seemed to achieve some peace with her upcoming death, particularly in the last week of her life. I asked her earlier this month if she wanted any help with maybe recording or writing notes to her children for later on. She said no, that she felt she had already said what needed saying. She said she wouldn’t know what would be an appropriate message for her kids in some future time, adding “Life flows.” The night before she died, in one of her last conscious actions in her hospital bed, she definitively pushed away oxygen from her face, saying “Enough.” A quote from “God Is In The Small Stuff and It All Matters.” “You can tell a little about a person by what she says about herself. You can tell a lot about a person by what others say about her. You can tell even more about a person by what she says about others.” It strikes me how rarely I ever heard Rebecca say something unkind toward someone else. I’ll close with a note she sent me on my birthday in November. She probably sent similar notes to many of you. “Happy, happy birthday. I hope you make time to celebrate life. Thank you so much for your love and support through these many difficult months. You’ve brightened the journey for me.” I know if Rebecca could be here now, she would have similar thanks for each of you.
Maj-Britt: Milt Socolar, Rebecca’s father-in-law will speak next.
Much of what I have to say has already been said. Rebecca was so special. Marlyn and I admired and cared for her deeply. She was a formidable influence for good in this crazy world of ours. Rebecca was not one to let life just happen. She seized every moment and turned it into useful purpose, whether serving those in need, meeting family demands that only she could fulfill, or gaining sustenance through absorbing the wonders of nature. We loved Rebecca for the joy, the humor, and sense of adventure she gave to Joshua, and for the loving home they shared with Jacob and Yvonne, whom they nurtured and guided toward the strong sense of national and worldwide responsibility each has. When we’re happy, life seems endless. Sad moments in our lives remind us that life is fragile and always ends too soon. But slowly the sadness of loss diminishes. Memories of happy times grow stronger and we gradually become aware of how fortunate we are to have such beautiful remembrances. We will all remember the spirit that animated Rebecca, a spirit that now amply resides in Jacob and Yvonne and will spread in generations to come. It should be comforting to know that with the spread of her spirit and the stories about her that will be told and retold, Rebecca remains with us.
Maj-Britt: Joan Magat, Rebecca’s neighbor will speak now.
I knew Rebecca best in this last year which was a sad year, so what I have to say is shaped by that sorrow. But Rebecca was not about sorrow, and my friendship with her is nothing but a happy treasure. Rebecca asked me once, many years ago, how our children at the tender ages of five and eight had fared living in France for a sabbatical year. A wonder for us all, and an immeasurable gift for them I said. A gift immeasurable, I said, for them to sense in their growing bones the breadth and depth of geography, the complexities of another culture, of others’ languages and morays, and that the love an loyalty of friends can be found and nourished anywhere. I didn’t know then that both she and Josh knew this already first-hand. Nor did I suspect that she and Josh would expose the two precious souls under their wings not just to the French, but to citizens of countries of every latitude and every color, colored by myriad beliefs. I think of that great gift to Yvonne and Jacob when I imagine Rebecca now.
If there be a heaven, Rebecca is at the pearly gates. And if there be a St. Peter, he asks Rebecca why she should enter the kingdom of heaven. Rebecca says that, in fact, she would rather not. She would rather stay in that circle of being where she lived with those she loved; where she rejoiced every day in finches pink backs and red-bellied rat-a-tat, in her daughter’s charity and clear-eyed sense of self, in her son’s idealism and candor and purposeful pursuit of every avian, in her husband’s song and deep, deep love. In the love of others, those with whom she worked, those near whom she lived, those who shared her genes and had known her forever. She would rather stay with kids she healed and taught others to heal, with kids in whose eyes she deeply looked everywhere in the world. The world? asks St. Peter. Tell me more. Well it’s wide, Rebecca says, and its people are as multihued as a goldfinch turning from winter to spring. It’s where one can swell with pleasure in sharing a search for shark’s teeth or a harpy eagle, or treasure hunt clues, or in speaking out loud those deep, fearful thoughts that shadow the heart and shake our sense of who we are. The world is heavy with dangers and sorrow, she adds, but it is buoyed by the human spirit to overcome, and I would rather be there than in heaven. And St. Peter, if there be a St. Peter, meets Rebecca’s direct gaze and says: You’ve already been to heaven, Rebecca. You lived it in your living. You held it in your heart. And you left it in the hearts of everyone you touched. And that touch taught them more than medicine or how to slip into the shoes of others less lucky in the accidents of the places and times of their births. Your touch taught them by their knowing you, by your example, how to live. With a joie de vivre as vast as the blue skies, with a modesty that masked you vast gifts, with selfless sincerity and uncommon courage, and devotion to every soul you knew and who knew you. You’ve been to heaven, Rebecca, St. Peter, should there be a St. Peter, would say. And we, everyone who loved you, were there too with you.
Maj-Britt: The family wants to invite others of you to share memories about Rebecca and stories with us today. We have a few minutes to do that, then Josh will be our final story. Marion is going to bring the microphone around.
Hello everyone. Rebecca was a dear friend, colleague and mentor to me. My name is Eliana Perrin. I imagine it was hard to be all three of those at once, yet she did so very gracefully. When I first joined faculty, she took me under her wing and yet quickly let me rise through that embrace. We talked about children and schools, manuscripts and grants, and her words always steadied me. But the word “balance” never came up. For Rebecca it wasn’t about balancing priorities. It was about doing all of them, and doing them well in the space they fit comfortably. I watched her fight to realize elusive rights, like part-time tenure and parental leave, and advocate on behalf of maltreated children. But through her tenacity came really a lesson of tolerance. And so today, Rebecca, because of you I am a little more steady, even when my voice quivers on the hardest of days. I am a little more grounded in my ultimate hopes and dreams, but don’t worry, not so much that I stop hoping or stop dreaming. I live my life with a little more purpose and direction, but don’t worry, not so much so that I cannot tolerate diversion with a higher goal or the laughter of my own or someone else’s children. Those are the diversions worth savoring. Rebecca, I shall never forget the lessons of your life or how lucky I am that your life intersected with mine in so many wonderful ways. I shall miss you very much.
Paula Bohr: Yes I am an old friend of Rebecca. I live in Denmark and I just felt I had to come. My friendship with Rebecca has not only meant a lot to me, but it had also directed my life. It had had a huge influence on me. When I came, my whole family said “You are going to be our representative from the Bohr family” and the forest in Tisvilde – I am also a representative of that – that’s where Becky also had a love affair and it was very mutual. There could be many things to say, but one thing I think is that many of us, and I speak for myself, don’t really know what it is to love, but Rebecca really, truly knew what it was, and showed me in every way.
I have so many memories that I’d like to share sometime. I hope that you’ll forgive in future conversations if I keep saying: “Here’s what Rebecca would say…” or “I remember what Ruby did” – I called her Ruby – or “Damn. Rebecca would have remembered to offer you something to eat or drink an hour and a half ago.”
Her presence is also making new memories for me. It’s reflected in Jacob’s and Yvonne’s passionate appreciation of human nature and of the natural world, their desire to do meaningful work, and their good-natured sense of humor. I’ll always hear her voice helping me to help them shape and fulfill their dreams.
What did Ruby mean to me? Well, you can imagine all of the talents and the special qualities we’ve heard about today placed in the service of just one couple. I got the benefit of all of that – the practical aspects of making a home and family life, the insights and sense of priorities, the will to see and be a part of the world, and the emotional support.
And there was more. The comfort of her arms, the beauty of her smile, her eyes sweet love crumbs. That comes from her favorite poem, by e e cummings, that begins “I like my body when it is with your body” and I got to hear her recite that poem many times. Even a simple hug from her was a gesture of unusual depth.
Rebecca’s body put her through some rough times. A major back operation to prevent worsening curvature of the spine, a miscarriage and a rather difficult pregnancy, and later a devastating disease and the suffering associated with its treatment. But she carried that body with such natural grace and lack of pretense. I will remember it as a perfect vessel for her spirit.
One vision of her comes to mind now. She and I traveled in 1984 to Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of Congo, to visit her mom and dad during their year in Kinshasa. In a large field near he mom’s childhood home, we attended a matondo – a festival of choirs from surrounding villages. We watched and listened, soaking up the rhythms and harmonies of the scene and getting translations of the Kikongo from her mom. When the choirs had all had a turn, lines were formed so everyone could walk up to the collection plate. The music was joyous, and many of the Congolese did a sort of dance step as they approached, deposited their contribution, and returned to their places. There were maybe eight or ten white people there, and we took our turns as well. But Ruby was the only one to join the dance, to raise her hand, shake her hips, and really share in the spirit of the event. The crowd just loved it. When she came back to her seat, she was handed more money, just so everyone could watch her do it again. In that moment, she expressed so many things that came completely naturally to her: She was enjoying herself, not setting out to make and impression. She was connecting with people in a way that they understood intuitively and truly appreciated. She was honoring her mom’s lifelong commitment to Congolese by valuing their culture, and she was making her dad beam with pride. And then, she was coming back to me and letting me share in the glow.
I’d like now for us to evoke the spirit of that event with an African song that Ruby loved to sing and hear and our choir will perform.
Choir: “Wana Baraka” (arr. S. Kirchner) Watch and listen
Maj-Britt: (Back to top)
And some words by the African poet Birago Diop:
Those who have died have never left
The dead are not under the earth
They are in the rustling trees
They are in the groaning woods
They are in the crying grass
They are in the moaning rocks
The dead are not under the earth
Those who have died have never left
The dead have a pact with the living
They are in the woman’s breast
They are in the wailing child
They are with us in the home
They are with us in the crowd
The dead have a pact with the living.
Josh: Something that Rebecca loved was a sing-along. I know she would have wanted us to leave on a happy note. I hope you’ll help me out. I am thinking now of the light that she brought to my life and to everyone around her. Watch Glenn – he’ll show you what to do.
Everyone: (with Josh on piano)
This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine…
Everywhere I go, I’m gonna let it shine….
Take this light around the world, I’m gonna let it shine….
This little light of mine, I’m gonna let shine….
Maj-Britt: Now let’s gather for food …
A reception with food from members of the CCCHUU congregation and a digital slide show of pictures of Rebecca followed.
