Reflections on the Life of Elvira Ruberto Couden
(9/26/13)

First of all, thank you all for coming. As I look across the room and see all of you, I know that Mother would have been honored to know that you came to pay your respects to her.

I would also like to thank the participants in our service today:
Chaplain Smith, who was so kind to Mother during her last years and particularly, her last days.
Dick and Gracie Garner, long-time friends, so kindly visited Mother and prayed with her.
Doug von Kriegelstein is a lifelong family friend, who also visited Mother during her last days.
Shelly Harring is yet another longtime friend, whose unflagging support has meant the world.
I am grateful to all of you, and as always, to my husband, Gil, for his love and support during these difficult last six years.

When I reflect on my mother’s life, I think of a woman who grew up in the most disadvantaged circumstances possible and rose above it. She was born in the inner city with gangs, disease, pollution, poverty, and the Great Depression. She became ill with TB and was sent away at the age of 16, for three years, during which time she received only one letter from her mother. Neither her mother nor father ever told her that they loved her.

The number one goal of most parents, it is to care for their children in such a way that their needs are met. A secondary goal for many parents, is to give their children more than what they had, be that spiritual, emotional, or material aspects of their upbringing.
As I reflect on Mother’s life, there are two main statements that can be said: (1) she did give infinitely more than she ever received in structure, material goods, and security than she ever experienced as a child.  And (2) the negative effects of her difficult childhood was an ever present influence in her life and in the life of our family. 

Mother worked harder than anyone else that I’ve ever known. She always kept a large garden and a small orchard. She sewed all of our clothes including my father’s suits. She made six loaves of bread every week for over 25 years, and prepared three meals a day for us. She put her heart and soul into being a homemaker because she felt that her children were her responsibility. It was a comfort to know that whenever we went home from school, be that elementary school or college, Mother would be there, --often with something hot on the stove and good smells throughout the house.

Our home in New York was paradise to Mother. She never tired of pointing out the contrast between the serene country surroundings and the city in which she was born. She often said it was heaven, and I have to agree.

My mother had a wonderful sense of humor. Once as a child, she was home unsupervised. When she heard my uncle come home from school, she decided to surprise him. She surprised him all right—she climbed onto his bunkbed and when he walked through the door, crammed a chamber pot over his head, nearly breaking his nose. It took the building super and some salad oil before it came off. Of her brother’s subsequent crooked nose she often quipped, “He was the only man in New York who could smell around corners after that.”

When I was 16, she and I had a major disagreement about whether or not I could wear a bikini to lay in the sun in our backyard. She thought a bikini was indecent, but I pointed out that the only eyes that could see me were the local cows, and I kept wearing my bikini in the sun. One day as I was laying on a blanket in the backyard, I saw a hunched over figure come around the back of the house. Without my glasses, I couldn’t see who it was, but whoever it was, they looked pretty suspicious: disheveled blond hair, trench coat, shuffling walk. And around the back of the house they came and started fumbling with the back doorknob. Leaping up and pulling a towel around me, I ran up to this person, quite concerned. “Can I help you?” I queried. They mumbled and tucked their chin down further into their coat. It was several moments of my questions and moving around the person to get a good look at them before I heard a characteristic snorting laugh of my mother and she turned to look me in the face. She had found an old blond wig and thought that she’d have a little fun with me and possibly teach me not to lay around in skimpy clothes. We laughed about that as recently as two weeks ago.

Since Mother worked so hard, she often fell asleep on the couch in the evening long before it was time for bed. She slept exceptionally soundly, which gave us license to do all sorts of things to her: put hats on her and snap pictures of her; tie her wrists to the couch legs then yell “Fire” and see her struggle in a sleepy stupor to get off the couch. She was a wonderful sport and I have numerous photos of Mother asleep with all sorts of items in her hands and on her head.

As a 14-year old girl, Mother used to listen to the opera on Saturdays and go out on the stoop afterward and sing her heart out. Her love for music never flagged. When I was growing up at home, if I ever got to church late, I never wondered if my mother was there. You could hear both of my parents’ singing at the top of their lungs—and they sang VERY LOUDLY—their voices soaring over everyone else’s. We kids would shrink down in embarrassment. Later, one of us would say, “Mommy, you sing too loud in church. It’s embarrassing.” She would retort in a superior voice, “I’M praising the Lord, so anyone else can think whatever they want.”

It wasn’t until years later when I was carried away singing with the congregation in church and noticed a man in front of me turning to look at me. Later, I commented to Gil about what I thought was rather daring behavior in turning in his seat like that. Gil responded, “Well Honey, you were singing awfully loud. You could be heard over everyone else. Of course he would turn around.” The apple didn’t fall far from the tree in that respect!

Mother loved animals. Every Sabbath that she came to spend with Gil and me at our house was marked by joyful barking of Baxter and Charlie, who would rush to greet her. She would hold Baxter for hours and make over him. When I called her in the evening, she’d say, “Put Baxter on the phone” and I’d hold the phone up to his ear so she could say a few words to him. She loved her dogs and cats that she had over the years.

But the city girl never could get used to the chickens or ducks that we had. She never went out to hang the clothes on the clothesline without carrying a broom because she was afraid of Donald the duck—my duck—who used to try to peck at her pink flip flops. (I taught him how to do that). She would storm into the house with the exclamation, “Barbara, get down here and get that bird out of the yard so I can hang the clothes.”

And when she found out that I had brought Giovanni, an orphan chick into the house to sleep in my bed next to me (actually, for two months, undetected), she hit the ceiling. I suppose it was the adolescent crowing that she heard once at the crack of dawn, coming from my bedroom. It was a long rant that she made that morning over breakfast, about disease from chickens, the unsuitability of having “birds” in the house, the scandal of being my age and having a chicken in my bedroom. It all fell on deaf ears, whilst my brother and I chuckled under our breath and rolled our eyes at each other behind her back.

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Mother has suffered tremendous pain in her life—pain that was never addressed in a way that helped her. She lived in the fear that her TB would reactivate and she feared leaving four defenseless children without a mother. As a result, she was extremely careful with her diet and worked hard to stay healthy—more than the vast majority of people. Some of the “healthy concoctions she made could turn the most settled stomach. Indeed, her “health cookies” could sink a battleship, as they contained every seed known to man. She snuck carob into everything that should have been chocolate. But she did her best and we were extremely healthy kids. Incidentally, she would not approve of serving cookies at her service today, even though she usually ate quite a few cookies and always seconds of desserts when she came to my house.

Because she herself had suffered in life, Mother always reached out to others in whatever way she could. She used to tell us to watch for the elderly at church who came in by themselves. We were tasked with inviting them home for lunch after church. Mother was generous and giving, even when she had little to give.

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When my father died, I did not think my mother would ever recover. Part of her never did. She simply did not want to be alive for much of the last seven years. I was therefore not surprised one day in May of this year when she told me that she had asked the Lord to take her life. But that was her prerogative: it was between her and God. She was diagnosed with lung cancer only a month later.

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As I’ve considered what to say today about my mother, I’ve realized that her death is too fresh in my mind, to be able to give a clear headed synopsis of her life. I see her suffering in the last three months, the behavioral changed, the confusion, and yet remember the softness of her skin, her kisses on my face, her reaching out to greet and kiss her caregivers. I also think of the sadness I felt as I watched her disappear day by day and the helplessness I felt as I tried to help her stay anchored in the here and now.  The sinking heart as I went to see her every day, only to notice that she looked worse, had more trouble breathing, and was more confused.

But there is hope in the story of my mother’s life, even though it started off poorly and ended sadly.

1)     When we invite God into our lives, He comes in. My mother had many faults—as we all do. She drove people from her. She didn’t think anyone loved her. She had a sharp tongue. But when I look at where she started in this life and what she was able to do to raise four children, without an example, making it up as she went along, praying her way along, encouraging in us a faith and steadfastness that comes from knowing God—I am reminded that God uses very human instrumentalities to work out His plans in the world. The hope for me in that is that if He used Mother, He will also use me, as imperfect as I am.

2)     Mother often said that we all do the best we can, even when it falls short of the ideal. We can be assured that people have good motives for the most part—that they are trying to do well by us. Of Mother, I can say that she certainly did the best that she could and I know that whatever she has said or done that has been less than the ideal was not because she had bad motives.

3)     God gives ample opportunity for healing. Mother’s time here at Linda Valley Villa was nothing short of a miracle for many reasons. The friendships she had here were healing for her. She had so many people here whom she told me were just like sisters to her—and since her relationship with her sisters had not been positive, the fact that she had women here who loved her, meant the world to her. When in the hospital being diagnosed with cancer, she told me that she had learned what love really is by having so many friends at the Villa who had expressed their care for her in many different ways. So to you who live here, thank you for helping with the healing of my mother’s spirit.

When my mother comes up out of the grave on that great resurrection morning, not only will her body be perfect and whole, but so will her spirit and her mind. My sister wrote my mother a beautiful letter that I shared with her last Sabbath. In part, she wrote,

I am looking forward to seeing you in heaven.  I know you’ll be there.  Then God will heal both our minds and bodies.  My wish for you now, is just to go to sleep in Jesus.  Then the next thing you’ll see is His face.  You’ll be whole.  No pain and the bad memories will only be dust.  You’ll have joy from seeing daddy, old friends and family.  No more sadness.  Only the knowledge of how special you are to God.  I plan on seeing you then.  I’ll be with the lions and singing in the choir.  We won’t have to talk about the past, but will know and finally understand it all.  I’ll hug and kiss you and it will be like we were never separated. 

There is victory in my mother’s death. Her story on this earth is over. She will never have to suffer again—physically or emotionally. She will never again experience depression and wonder if her life meant anything to anyone.  She will soon know as she is known of God; feel love unbounded; and experience the peace and security of being safe forever with God.  Meanwhile, I embrace the sparkling aspects of my mother and look forward to the day when we can be together again in heaven.

What a wonderful God we have.