Tuesday, April 9, 2019
When they talk about the Greatest Generation, they mean Marge and Artie Reilly. Just as there many folks who claimed to be the 5th Beatle, me and my brother Christopher claimed to be the 8th and 9th Reillys, as we stayed with them every morning before school so my Mom could go to work. And the things we learned! There was a such thing as breakfast, beyond Poptarts! That the strongest force in the universe, far beyond splitting the atom, was your parents' subtle disapproval. That above all, only two things really mattered - family, and America. Mrs. Reilly had a Saint's strength, always calm, giving her all to others, asking nothing for herself. It was on Mrs. Reilly's shoulders that other women, like my Mom, stood and reached up to the glass ceiling as teachers and judges and Senators, long before "daycare" was even a word. It did take a village - it was called Levittown. The stories are legion, the laugher long, the warmth remembered. Good rest you, Mrs. Reilly. We shall not see your like again.
