“Your friends will know you better in the first minute they meet you than your acquaintances will know you in a thousand years.” Bach
My friend, Eileen Cater passed away yesterday in New Jersey from long standing complications of Juvenile Diabetes. Eileen was a young 59 years old. From the moment I got the call this morning of her passing from her husband Bill, I knew I needed to say what was in my heart after all these years.
Eileen and I met, through our husbands, at a
Dartmouth Class of ’74 Reunion over 25 summers ago-- It was the class reunion Eileen and I secretly dubbed the “
New Wives Coming-Out Party.” Eileen, whose father was a Professor at the Medical School, had grown up in Hanover and knew the scene inside and out. She was in her element. She invited me to tag along to “meet and greet,” I knew a mentor when I saw one and decided to go along for the ride. It was probably one of the smartest moves I ever made.
Eileen was capable of working a room like a politician. She was fun, smart, open and friendly. If she read the bio’ on someone once, she knew it cold. She had a wonderfully keen and raspy little sense of humor, which could cut both ways without leaving a bite mark. She put me at ease. So between my mouth and her sense of humor, and the fact we both shared our dreaded
“Christmas Eve birthdays”-- we took an instant liking to each other. It was a near instant bond.
We became ladies of a “certain age” long before that phrase became fashionable. We shared promises and secrets—and like good friends
we kept them to ourselves. At times we maintained one another’s sanity or came to the other’s rescue, because as Eileen would say,
“That’s what real friends are supposed to do. Now get going!” Over the years Eileen taught me what real friendship was. We were both busy with work, family and civic projects. So we multitasked like most women. We found the time to visit, talk and write when we could, stealing minutes or a couple days here or there. We shared the good and bad times. And… at times we didn’t talk at all, especially when we were both being headstrong. But because we really cared about each other, we got over it. After our father’s died, I noticed both of our perspective changed for the better and we had grown a little older and wiser.
“Carpe Diem! No Regrets!” became our mantra.
In our last conversation a couple months ago, we caught up on the family and friends chitchat and how she was doing. She was very retrospective that day in a way that I’d never heard her before—telling me how lucky she’d been to find Bill, and how proud she was of Kerry. But like Eileen, she was looking forward to spring and summer to come so they could get the pool ready for the season, and may be a trip to New Hampshire. We parted on good terms, knowing we truly cared about one another, just like the old days.
Hindsight being 20/20: little did I know this would be the last conversation I had with Eileen. I do remember we signed off that last conversation by saying we loved one another. I’m very glad I said it.
No regrets. I will miss her.
** PS: Eileen and Bill were involved in the local Kiwanis. Eileen was also teacher and tutor. The family has established
the Eileen Cater Scholarship Fund through the New Jersey District Kiwanis Foundation. The scholarship will be made available to NJ District Circle K members.
The NJ Kiwanis have published a lovely obit on there site.
Pousse-Café in a stemed cordial glass. It was a riot to watch them I'll never forget. What I did learn was the trick to layering the liquors is to S-L-O-W-L-Y trickle the room temperature liquors over the back of a small teaspoon into the Pousse glass (or stemmed cordial) so the layers can stand up on their own in distinct layers.
