I tried writing this eulogy several times without much luck. I had wanted to write something worthy of such a remarkable woman. Something that would reflect her world travels, her great generosity, her sense of civic duty, and he often mischievous delightful curiosity about our world. I wanted to write a eulogy that would stand testimony to wonderful contradictions in her. A woman who studied history and art, but taught science, who traveled the world, but chose to live in the same small town she grew up in, who held such big dreams for her children, but had such a modest view of herself.

I was going to start with a quote from T.S. Eliot's the wasteland that I only finally understood during her last days. And I was going to end with Walt Whitman's Oh Me, Oh Life. If you know it, you'll probably agree it fits.

But I couldn't write that eulogy. Maybe I needed more time or distance or more emotional strength, probably all three. Someday perhaps I will write it. I hope so. Until then, all I can do is share some of what my mother meant to me.

She was my mother, of course, so she did mothery things. She showed me how to make jam and bread and fudge. She showed me how to rake leaves and paint doors and hang pictures. She read me Tolkien and Watership Down and A Once and Future King. She even tried to teach me to eat vegetables.

When I had an appendectomy, she brought me a stuffed triceratops in the hospital. I might have been a big eighth grader, but I was still her little boy.

She taught me much in life, both in and out of the classroom. I still know much of the basic physical science she taught me way back when. And I still remember the other lessons she taught, such as having her students read John Hersey's Hiroshima so we'd know that science could have consequences.

She taught me kindness when we took in a baby robin and nursed it back to health. She taught me integrity by trusting me to do the right thing, and she taught me about justice by not letting me off the hook when I didn't. She taught me to not be afraid of the world, by showing me that she wasn't. And she taught me intellectual curiosity by sharing her own with me. Without those lessons, I doubt I would have had the strength to find my own path in life, a path that sadly led me far from her beloved Southborough.

Since I went to Fay School, but my younger sister did not, there were sometimes days when Fay had a day off that the public schools did not. On those days, my mother would take me out to lunch, just the two of us. I remember those lunches so fondly now.

I think those lunches were where we really started becoming not just mother and son, but friends and she remained one of my best friends until she died. I didn't talk to her every day, although I did several times a week. Sometimes it was just a quick call to say hi while running some errand. Other times, we'd get into two hour long discussions of science, society, religion, business, and politics. Nothing was off limits and we didn't have to agree, although we often did.

If I wanted to commiserate about something going wrong with my house, she was there. If I needed to vent about some insanity in my life, she'd let me. And if I just wanted to hear a friendly voice and shoot the breeze, that was fine too.

I miss my mother and my teacher. But I think I miss my friend most of all. But I still find myself talking to her. And I hope she still hears me. And I hope someday we'll be together again.