Avis de décès de Helen Harris - Nécrologie - MesAieux.com

1913 - 2013Even on the last of her 36,646 days, my Aunt Helen Harris still showed good-humor. Born on January 5th, 1913, Helen had always loved the opera and playing golf and hiking mountains. She used to take a cabin in New Hampshire and vacationed once in Alaska. She had wanted to learn to fly when she was young, but no one would let her because she was a woman. ("Where did all those old men get off thinking they were the boss?") In 1947 she married Robert Harris, a New York school principal. Sometime thereafter Helen developed a taste for vodka and orange juice, but we're not sure if this was related. She lived with Bob (he died in 2008?) in the same 2-story brownstone at 2283 East 19th Street in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn since 1949. She worked as a secretary in the Brooklyn school system, voted democrat, liked shrimp scampi, gave to the Sierra Club, loved to chat at the beauty salon, once won $90 on a Natchez river boat, worried about her surviving children Sandy Hartman (62) and Neil Harris (65) and the next thing she knew, one hundred years had gone by. Helen was old for a long time. She suddenly turned health-conscious and gave up smoking. At 80. Some guy in a Volvo backed over her behind a Duane Read when she was 94. That couldn't kill her either. It was nip-and-tuck when they cancelled "The Golden Girls", but she even survived that. Helen's big brother, Leon, had been the eldest of the four Schneider children born to Sam and Sadie back in Bayonne, New Jersey in 1910. He was also the first to go. Then went Uncle Ralph and Ralphie's twin sister, Aunt Shirley. And now Aunt Helen, the last of the Shmohicans. Not only was Helen not afraid of death, but for weeks she'd actually been annoyed about how long it was taking death to come take her away. To cheer her I'd explain that death was probably stuck in traffic. Finally, around 11:30ish Friday night, May 31st 2013, Helen cashed in her chips. She died at home in her own bed quietly in her sleep without pain or tubes or doctors. True, only several hours before, she had reiterated to me the fact that "nothing was fabulous!" but she sort of snickered evilly when she said it. As per her instructions, Mt. Sinai was called to take her body for medical students to practice on. No service ("For who? Everybody I know is dead!"). No funeral (see above). None of that awkward Shiva stuff. ("Who needs to be bothered?!") Eventually, when they're done dissecting her, she'll be cremated and sent back to us in what looks likes a shoebox. No official eulogy either, so consider this the best you're likely to get. Helen wasn't big on the whole "closure" thing. Helen Harris lived a long, "no complaints" life. And anyway, when you get to be 36,646 days old, nothing's fabulous.