Eulogy for Madeleine Ferrara, our Mom,

at St. Mary’s church, Fremont Center, Illinois

by her son Bob Ferrara on March 1, 2007

Thank you Fred, and Father Ron, and all of you for being here to honor our mom, Madeleine, on her 92^nd Birthday today.

You should all know that she did not suffer at the end, she died a natural death at her home in her bed, with all five of her children in the next room. One of her grandchildren, Elizabeth Butterfield, was also with us. Liz is a hospice nurse, literally an angel, and she made sure all Mom’s needs were attended to, while she guided all of us through these last few days. Two other granddaughters, Michelle Anderson and Carolyn Gritton also provided great comfort and help to their grandmother these past weeks.

Mom died as she had lived. Hers has been a very good and full life, one of many accomplishments and many beautiful pictures. Through good times and bad, she was sustained by great faith, helping people whenever she could. Besides countless friends and her five children, she was blessed with 14 grandchildren, and even 17 great-grandchildren. And the youngest, little Mason Gritton, all of 4 months old, visited with her on the day she died and she smiled at him.

Madeleine Payette was born in Seattle, Washington on Queen Anne hill 92 years ago. She came from wonderful lineage, generations of French Canadians going all the way Pierre Payette du San Amour who came to new France in 1665. He was a soldier who came to protect the colonists from the Iroquois. Despite being captured for 2 and a half years, he and his wife Louise were able raise at least 11 children. Part of the family migrated west through Michigan and then to the Dalles, Oregon where her amazing father was born in 1889 as

Francois de la Salle Jean Baptiste Payette de San Amour but we called him “Gramps”.

Her Mom Genevieve was descended from Irish, like the colorful Hewitts, and another line of French Canadians, including the Pelletieres. One relative was a great physicist in France, and another founded an order of nuns and was canonized in 1940. St. Mary Euphrasia’s portrait appears near the main altar of the Vatican.

Our feeling is that the Vatican should also plan space for another portrait of our mom nearby.

It is impossible in words to capture the essence of anyone, even Mom. But for now I’d like to share just a few anecdotes that my brother and sisters chose two days ago.

Mom had a happy childhood, growing up in and around Seattle. She was the oldest of four children and her obvious artistic talents were encouraged by parents and grandparents, who lived with them. She adored all of them.

In fact, with her parent’s permission, she could postpone household chores while engaged in something creative. She learned quickly, and when she was around 4 developed a special talent for drawing elephants. In fact, she perfected the sketching of a particular type of elephant, one with a sloping back and short back legs. One day, her dad found a sloping-backed elephant on the back of toilet above the seat.

“Did you draw this elephant” Her Dad asked. For whatever reason, my Mom said “no”. In fact, under repeated questioning she kept denying the elephant was her work under and even as various consequences were imposed. She never did tell her dad that she did it. In fact, her dad spanked her – for fibbing, not for drawing the elephant. It was the only spanking she ever had.

Mom would tell us this funny little story, perhaps to make amends or maybe just to let us know that she, too, made mistakes. From our perspective, this illustrated the very strong will she had.

Growing up during the Depression, food & work were scarce for a generation. Fortunately, grampa was a railroad engineer on the Northern Pacific and her family was usually better off than most. They lived near the railroad tracks and had a nice garden in Auburn, Washington. She remembers her family having regular dinners for hobos because that was what you were supposed to do.

As much as she loved the Northwest, it was Chicago that had the opportunities for a young, aspiring commercial artist. So, in July of 1935, she headed east to Chicago. She found work for $15 per week at the Boston Store at the corner of State & Madison. This store, with its 17 story building, billed itself as the tallest department store in the world. In later years, she would work at Carson, Pirie Scott, as their female art director. She eventually had a great 40 year run with Marshall Field’s.

In 1938, she fell in love and married our dad, Vincent Ferrara. A few years later, our oldest sister Marie was born, followed by four more in the next four years - Nicole, Gen, then my twin brother Ray and me. We were the heaviest twins born in Chicago’s Passavant Hospital up to that time, 15 pounds of babies.

She continued to work all through this time. As Mary Ferris and her friends from Fields know so well, she had a wonderful career as a commercial artist. We are especially proud that was asked to design the Chicago Fire Centennial plate, the President Eisenhower 100^th birthday plate, and the Illinois Sesquicentennial plate. The Sesquicentennial is in between the centennial and bicentennial – the State of Illinois 150^th birthday plate. And her wonderful artistic skills were passed on to her daughters Marie and Gen and now her grandson Gabriel.

Now Mom was also good psychologist. When we were pre-schoolers she would take all five of us to Foster Beach on Lake Michigan, maybe a mile walk from the house. Managing five youngsters for a day, through city streets and around the shore, was difficult. I know this is hard to believe, but we were not always well behaved. And one day we were particularly out-of-control on the way home, so she informed us that we were so bad would not be going to Foster Beach tomorrow. Next day she looked out the window and said “Gee, it is a wonderful sunny day. It’s too bad we can’t go the beach today because you kids did not behave yesterday”. We were of course crushed. This actually went on for weeks, and in fact, we never did go back that summer. Even during that fall, she would look out the window and say the same thing. It was not cruelty.

The part we did not understand then was our misbehavior had occurred on the very last day of beach season. But it worked in spades. And next year at the beach, we were absolute angels.

After raising the family, our parents divorced. At first, Mom was terribly hurt. But she rebounded and in fact entered what we think was a very satisfying part of her life. She was involved in her work, her family, and friends. She moved to Sandburg Village, on Chicago’s near North side. It was a vibrant location, but a short way to the corner of Oak & Sedgwick, where our Dad was born in an Italian neighborhood that was leveled to make way for the Cabrini Green Housing project.

Then 30 some years ago, Mom moved out to Sylvan Lake, near Mundelein. This wonderful community has been so good to her. She stayed active as an artist, painting and drawing in the back room of her little house.

One great artistic collaboration of these years was one with with my father-in-law Bob Baram, a remarkable man who was a writer and a poet. He and Mom became great friends and when my kids were very young, Bob wrote a special book of poems dedicated to them, which my Mom illustrated. Bob also introduced her to his friends the Daughters of St. Paul, a wonderful order of nuns that concentrates on publishing and journalism.

With retirement coming, she found time to travel. And travel she did – China, Mexico, Europe, usually with Mary Ferris and other artist friends. They would paint scenes of the beautiful places they saw. And there was a great trip to Barbados for my brother Ray’s wedding. And she went to Egypt and Israel with her daughter Marie and granddaughter Laura, a three generation trip!

Our family is extremely grateful to our sister Gen. Gen came to live with Mom 14 years ago, and has cared for her these last several years as she aged. Though Mom has not traveled for many years, she was quite active locally in St. Mary’s.

The church selected her as Parishioner of the Year at least once … or perhaps as many as a dozen times. St. Mary’s has been wonderful to her and she really loved this church. She will be buried in the cemetery next door, just under the outstretched right hand of Jesus.

In her declining years, she stayed as active she could around the house, where she painted until last year – and really liked to keep the outside clean. A favorite exercise was picking up acorns, twigs, and leaves from the lawn and patio. She also spent a lot of time in prayer.

As Mom’s condition worsened last week my sister Nikki came down from Minneapolis. Nikki is a very experienced caretaker and in fact was ordained a minister just over a year ago. A few days later, Nick’s daughter Elizabeth (Liz), a hospice nurse for many years insisted she should come and did.

On Friday, Gen asked Mom to squeeze her hand if she wanted the rest of us to come. She did. By mid-day Saturday we were all at her side. As most of you know, the house is not that big, so there was lots of activity.

Though Mom was unable to talk, she could hear. And smile. Like she did, when her granddaughter Carolyn brought her newest son, Mason, to visit. Mason is cool, though he’s only four months old. You will smile when you see him, too.

On Saturday evening, Liz, the hospice nurse, suggested that we do the four gifts. None of the rest of us had heard of these 4 gifts, but now we can never forget them. We’d love to share them:

When you are with a loved one who may soon leave you forever, say these 4 things:

I love you

I ask your forgiveness for any hurt I have caused you

I forgive you for any hurt you may have caused me

You have our permission to leave this life. We will carry on.

We are sure Mom heard as the five of us did these 4 gifts together.

Soon after, when we were all conversing at the kitchen table just outside her room, Gen felt it would be a good idea to light sweet smelling candles in Mom’s room. So she dutifully lit one, then came out to get another.

Liz the nurse was the first to notice “What do I smell? Is that a candle? Holy smokes, there is oxygen in there! You can’t have oxygen near an open flame!” My Mom had an oxygen tank to help her breathing, which was becoming more labored each day.

Amidst the bedlam in the kitchen, Gen dashed back in and blew out the candle. Then she looked down to Mom and realized she stopped breathing.

Then it all dawned on us that Mom had picked her time to go to heaven, a short time window when none of her children were in the room. It was one of the few times she was alone that day. I’m told mothers often do this to spare their loved ones.

After this, we lit the candles and had our vigil the rest of that evening at Mom’s bedside. We cried, and laughed, and remembered what she taught us:

Let us not mourn the absence of the flame,

But rather celebrate how brightly it burned.

Thanks to all of you for being here today.