Comments on: MAKING “NEW BEST FRIENDS” – A tutorial from Arlene

By: Personal Growth with Corinne Edwards » GRIEF - Beginnings and endings

Personal Growth with Corinne Edwards » GRIEF - Beginnings and endings — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 18:39:58 +0000

[...] ABOUT ARLENE [...]

By: Personal Growth with Corinne Edwards » GOOD NIGHT, ARLENE - We’ll see you in our dreams

Tue, 13 May 2008 20:08:47 +0000

[...] The original article on Arlene can be read here [...]

By: doris and dick seidlitz

doris and dick seidlitz — Wed, 07 May 2008 18:38:21 +0000

Corrine,

What more is there to say–it’s all been said in the blogs I read. The major tragedy is that Arlene will not be able to read them. She never did things so people would love and appreciate her–she always did things out of her deepest heart and never asked anything in return.
We met her at Willie Hecker’s apartment in the 60′s and like everyone else became her “best” friend. When she came to NY she would always call and say, I’m calling you first.” I always wondered how many other people she said that to–but it didn’t matter.
One thing we did teach her was to be on time–we were always guilty of being late and taught ourselves not to be and Arlene, in her later years would always be on time.
We traveled with her to France, St. Barts, Capri and she knew people wherever. A fond recollection we had was one day walking down the street in Capri when all the jewelers ran out and greeted Arlene and Lee encouraging them to come into the shop. But much as she loved jewelry she was never ostentatious or showy–it was all for herself never to impress people.
We knew and loved Stevie and Lee and her love of both of them was unflagging.
We spent two weekends in Chicago with her after she became ill and she was always thinking of the other person, accepting her fate gracefully.
She was our dear, dear friend and we will love her forever.
Doris and Dick Seidlitz

By: florrie

florrie — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 01:19:40 +0000

you are the one Corrine, I don’t know how else to express it, but anyone who can call you friend is so exceptionally lucky….Who else could ever create this testimony to our friend, and it says it all. Even those who found it difficult to write, are reading it, over, and over, and it is so meaningful for everyone. Each and every friend and relative of Arlenes has something familiar to all of us to write; and we all appreciate it. No surprises from anyone ,it is all Arlene, and how much we love her, and will miss her….BUT, you did it !!!!and without you, Corrine, it wouldn’t have been shared. Arlene gave me so much in the years I have been here, Corrine,and now she gave me you.!
P.s. if this doesn’t print to you, I am ready for lessons !!!!!

By: Paul Van Name

Paul Van Name — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 16:05:06 +0000

They don’t make them like Arlene Shelly anymore.

I will miss her wit, sense of insight and crystalline thinking.

She was a raconteur extraordinaire with the warmest of hearts.

The world will be a much less interesting place without her.

Paul Van Name

By: Rhea Freeman

Rhea Freeman — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 12:04:55 +0000

I’ve started speaking to people I don”t know at the supermarket. The 99 year old woman shopping for Passover has become a new friend. The woman filling her shopping basket with Elderberry juice; with whom I discussed the benefits of this nectar and offering to her information on complementary medicine – another new friend.

Thank you Arlene, for teaching me how to make new friends. Arlene knew how to live. She also knows how to die,
She called me her sister. I will miss her.

Rhea

By: Peter Van Name

Peter Van Name — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 12:01:44 +0000

Where do I even begin to write about my friend Arlene. I called her a few years ago out of the blue, at a time when everything was just fine and everyone was healthy to let her know that next to my mother and father she was one of the most influential people in my life. I don’t know what the female version of a “Mench” is but that’s Arlene. Arlene is grace, elegance, empathy and sincerity. She has an amazing ability to be able to relate to anyone, anywhere and on almost any level. She is always so well dressed, beautifully put together and gorgeous however she has never been vain or out to impress anyone. No one knew how to live and love like Arlene. She and Lee were explorers and adventures. The traveled everywhere and people loved them every where they went because they always had the openness and curiosity about them.

Arlene has been a trusted confidant and advisor to me and countless others, always without judgment.
She, Lee and Stevie have been a wonderful example of love and compassion. They have welcomed us into their family and we have always welcomed them into ours.

When I brought my wife home to Chicago years ago to “meet the family” during the holidays, she told me Arlene was one of the people who made her feel most welcome and at home.

I have great sadness that Arlene is facing a very difficult time. She faces it however with friends and relatives who have all rallied around her with so much love. They would do anything for her. When Arlene moves on to her next great adventures, we should all know and remember that our world is a better, brighter place as a result of having her in our lives. Arlene’s example of love, kindness and caring will live forever in my heart and I am sure in all those who know her.

All my love,

Peter

By: Alex

Alex — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 11:56:08 +0000

As far as I’m concerned, there has never been a world without Arlene Shelley. To me, it’s been the Sun, the Moon and Arlene.
Arlene knew me my entire life. She and my mother first met back in 1965, shortly before my mom was pregnant with me.

It is difficult to encapsulate my thoughts about a person whom I have known for so long and has been such a close part of my family.
Arlene has seen me as a newborn, a young boy, a young man and now a person with a wife and son of my own.
I shall always look back at my time with Lee, Arlene and Stevie, with a heart full of love and gratitude.

From swimming pool parties to the 1970′s to countless birthdays, Holiday gatherings and other occasions, I consider myself
very lucky to have been associated with such wonderful people. We had so many good times.

Arlene always had a nice word to say and was always enthusiastic about what I was doing in school, work or other pursuits. Arlene loved
music and would always find something to appreciate about it, whether it was the Beatles, jazz standards or Punk Rock.

She was always so complimentary and affirming of me whenever I saw her. . She never tired of my insisting that she tell
the story again and again about how her father (a Chicago Patrolman in the 1920′s) knew and interacted with Al Capone.
She and I loved many similiar kinds of entertainment such as Jack Benny or the Marx Brothers.

When Dawn and I married, it was Lee and Arlene who threw our special wedding dinner in China Town the night before.
Arlene always knew the perfect place to go.

Arlene was a wonderful friend and truly the epitome of class, understatement and elegance.

Arlene, from myself, Dawn and Julie II, we will always love and cherish you.

By: Florrie

Florrie — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 21:07:46 +0000

I read Corinne’s blog and I cried, because I have to tell you I have a friend who is just like that, and her name is Arlene.. I was hoping that her cancer would go into remission and stay there, and for a while it looked like it might, but I realized when I spoke to her on Sunday, she is really getting sick.
Tell me what will happen to all those Best Friends? Will they just go on making more? I don’t think I will, I do have some of the new best friends I also have come to know on planes, trains and real estate….but the ones I have had forever….will it ever be the same ?

I wrote this in Corrine’s blog as soon as I read it….then;and since then, we have been fortunate enough to celebrate Arlene’s Birthday, and enjoy it with her. Even when she was able to blow out the candles.
We have all had time to visit more, and talk about old times more. And we have done that. Arthur and Arlene and I have spent some time talking these past weeks , and we are grateful for that. We talked about old fiends, some of whom are no longer with us,looked at pictures of the Trillings and Steve with my first Grandchild,(how sweet was that to find.!)
The first time we met two months after we moved from New York, at a New Years Eve party in 1962., and all the strange things that happened that night. So many things after…
.
The morning,very early, I awoke to find Arlene next to me in my bed…well, she drove Stevie to work very early , and didn’t feel like going home , so why not.? Arthur was getting the kids off to school, and said,”go on up”.

We cooked together, we learned together, we shopped together, and we shared so much…Arlene often said ,”You and I, Florrie, had the same Mother”, she was so right, They came from the same mold .
They expected perfection as a rule, and didn’t feel any need to praise it.

As we all know Arlene was effusive with her compliments…but they were never hollow.
She was loved dearly by all of us, and friends far and wide; and there is not a person, young, old, male or female , relative, employee,caregiver, hairdresser, salespeople at stores,and the world at large, anywhere she ever graced with her presence who will not miss her .

Her last word to us were I love you with all the love my heart can hold…We cannot ever forget that.

By: S Saltzman

S Saltzman — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 00:07:58 +0000

Knowing Arlene…..these words hold for me and many that know her I am certain, such a vast array of lifes’ most wonderful things; joy, love, enlightment, humor, wit, beauty, extradorinary friendship, kindness, caring, constructive criticism and elated praise….I could go on with evey lofty adjective that there is to write but truly, just knowing her has affected my life so profoundly. I am so fortunate to have Arlene as my dear, dear friend, mentor, “fashionista extradoinaire”, world class traveling gal pal, shop till you drop for you name it anywhere we would happen to be on the planet, usually Paris or New York, searching for life’s little treasures.
And a treaure she is to many; her lovely family that I know even though most of them don’t know me. I have sharred their lives through Arlene; her loving friends who have become my dear friends.
Our Mothers even share the same birhtday, today as a matter of fact, April 21. I was a child blessed with wonderful parents like Arlene and both of our Mothers influenced us
so positively. I would like to share a poem that my mother wrote in 1969. She was a published poet and had won awards for her writings.

HOLE IN THE AIR

Mourn silently,
I tell you
Mourn silently.
Say nothing.
Leave words to those
who cannot mourn.
Grieve quietly,
I say, grieve quietly.
Touch nothing.
Do not stir this air.
I am measuring
and cannot comprehend
How a small being
Can leave so vast
A hole in the air
That I, larger,
Am lost in it.
Nor how her ambience
Filling it, overflowed,
Spilling everywhere.
Nor how a small voice
Stilled, leaves not
Silence, but absense
Of it sound,
Floiwn beyond the
Reach of despair.

Arlene will always be with me.Knowing her… I am truly blessed. I am so very lucky.