Remembering an Old Friend

https://www.vcstar.com/story/news/local/2016/10/30/claudia-harrison-childrens-advocate-dies-cancer/93010314/

I do not know what made me think of Claudia yesterday or motivated me to pursue an update.  I'd had a few occasions to reach back this calendar year.  My Ramapo '69/'70 classes gathered last spring, my class '69, Claudia's '70.  I opted not to attend but tracked down a few old friends shortly thereafter whose presence at the reunion would have been more of an incentive to attend.  No, I did not have Claudia in my mental awareness let alone must see again list.  In August I gathered with some other former classmates not seen since graduation.  One was the daughter of my mother's close friend, each parent dying young of the same malignancy just few years apart.  I was never close to her daughter but it was great to see her again and learn how well the half century has treated her.

I wasn't all that close to Claudia either but our mothers were close friends and I admired her.  Maybe it's the daughters of the mothers' chums that restored the awareness but it was the admiration that induced me to seek her life's summary.  I remember her more from Hebrew School and related activities at the JCC of Spring Valley than from public school, a friendly energetic person who would run for office, make fast quips, and always seemed more cheerful than anyone else.  She had an older brother who appeared around the synagogue and it's youth activities, though less a presence than Claudia.  I graduated first, moved on to college, and come the next admissions cycle learned through our mothers that she was headed to Tufts.  And there the contact stopped.

While Claudia never made it to Medicare/Retirement age, she may not have looked forward to retiring.  Her obituary, at age 64, reinforced my impression that energetic, self-directed people remain that way indefinitely.  She was engaging to me at a time when few people were but the tributes reflect an innate drive to be the person who not only derives satisfaction in mingling but shares that with the recipient.  The obit gives a good summary of what I would have predicted for her, success in what she set out to do and attention to the most neglected.  I admired her back then with far less reason than I have to admire her today.