I HAD A VERY DEAR FRIEND.
Her name was Roberta Ann Cecil but for reasons best known only to her, she disliked “Roberta” and always went by “Ann.”
- Ann was the daughter of Paul and Faith Cecil and sister to one brother, John. John married Janice and after living in Michigan for some years, they moved to California. John and Janice had a daughter named Morgan.
Ann had an English degree from Rutgers and a masters in Statistics from Syracuse.
She was active in literary groups and worked for years at the local university.
She lived for awhile in Danbury CT, Syracuse, Harrisburg PA, and Pittsburgh.
Ann died childless at age 71 in Pittsburgh PA.
So what is the point of this entry?
Ann was interested in genealogy.
She was not just a tombstone reader; she visited any living relative she could locate and delved into their — and her — history.
When she died of cancer at only 71 years she asked to be cremated and the ashes — for wont of a better term — “disposed” of with little fanfare.
“Fanfare”probably is an excellent choice of word for Ann since she had fans aplenty.
But the thing that continues to haunt me is her desire to leave no trace.
Certainly she left her mark on a number of individuals, including this scrivener.
She left her mark on the literary group.
She left her mark on the university.
But for those who come after her, those budding genealogists who want to follow the Cecil line, there is a dead end; no “Who was Ann?” or any history at all of the woman known to most as Ann Cecil.
Once the on-line obits and eulogies are forgotten, so too Ann Cecil.
No one, not even those of us who knew Ann, live forever, and as we fade from life so, too, the memory of Ann Cecil.
It’s sad.
Ann was a woman of many talents and even more interests.
She was a woman who deserved to be remembered if by nothing more than a marker, a “Kilroy was here” plaque somewhere.
As I get older, I realize that even if Ann had children of her own, one or two generations later family would be hard pressed to remember Ann.
On the other hand, people such as this scrivener occasionally visit cemeteries — especially old cemeteries in odd places — to read and cogitate or speculate on the “residents.” Who they were, how they lived; how they died.
When you see a number of markers with close dates of death the assumption is that a disease passed through, taking its toll. If a marker lists a date of death shortly after a date of birth you almost can feel the parents’ pain.
I don’t know WHY Roberta Ann Cecil elected to forego a marker, a plaque, or some other physical indication that she shared herself with so many.
Ann always did things her way. For her, that was the right way.
But I still can’t fathom why a person who chased history would erase herself from the history that she made.
PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.
Truth is an absolute defense to defamation. Defamation is a false statement of fact. If the statement was accurate, then by definition it wasn’t defamatory.
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