This evening I got a call from Ethie Corcodilos Compagna. Ethie lives near me in Northern California, and the good news is, Ethie and I finally made plans to meet for lunch next month. We've both lived in the San Francisco Bay area for many years but the only time we saw one another was at one or another of our class reunions.
But, I'm sorry to say, Ethie did call with sad news, which is that her dear friend and our fellow classmate, Lorraine Tortessi Reilich, passed away at her home near Santa Rosa, California, last Saturday after a courageous battle against cancer.
Amazingly, few of us who saw and talked with Lorraine at the class reunion just two short months ago realized how ill Lorraine was. As you can see from the photo here taken at the Friday night mixer, she looked absolutely beautiful. That she was able to make the trip to Pueblo from California is a testament to her great will and fortitude.
But those of us who saw Lorraine witnessed a beautiful woman having a great time with old friends. It was the first reunion Lorraine had attended, and Ethie said she was so glad she came.
Unfortunately class reunions don't allow us nearly enough time to catch up with everyone, find out what has been happening in people's lives over the intervening decades since we all graduated and scattered in a hundred directions. But Ethie told me a beautiful story about Lorraine that I would like to share with you on this blog...
It seems that Lorraine married a man who was significantly older than she was and those who cared for her expressed concern that she would be a widow for many years due to this vast age difference. But Lorraine married her love, Harry Reilich, who was an interesting man with a distinguished career in California - working on and designing bridges - big, famous bridges - both here in the Bay area and further south in San Diego.
Harry and Lorraine lived together for many years, and in fact Lorraine held a 90th birthday party for Harry last year. Recently, on October 26, Lorraine's husband, Harry Reilich, passed away. A few weeks later, Lorraine followed him. Contrary to the predictions, she had been a widow for less than a month.
Yet another reminder, dear friends, that our time on earth is much too short.
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