Can we all mourn our friend together?

Our beloved Gailcalled died this morning with family, friends and Milo at her bedside. Her daughter asked me to post.

Here is her obituary:

“Gail Ann Calder, 78, died peacefully at home in Spencertown, NY, on Saturday, October 24, surrounded by her family and friends.

Born in the Bronx, NY, in 1936 to Leonard and Helen Finkel, Gail grew up in Larchmont, NY, and attended Mamaroneck High School. After earning a B.A. in astronomy from Wellesley College in 1958, Gail worked as an assistant to the astronomer and ufologist, J. Allen Hynek, at the Harvard Observatory in Cambridge, MA. During this time, she married Stephen Wald of Brookline, MA, where they had two children, John and Alison.

Gail taught elementary school French at the Town School in Manhattan, and met her second husband, Fred Calder. They moved to Philadelphia, where she worked as a college guidance counselor at Germantown Friends School for 14 years. In 1986, she and Fred left Philadelphia for rural Spencertown, NY, where she fell in love with the area and became a valued volunteer in the community. Gail was involved with the Spencertown Academy, the Austerlitz Historical Society, and the Chatham Film Club. She was also a poll watcher during elections, and hosted visiting musicians for the Columbia Festival Orchestra.

Gail loved to watch the stars and planets at night, and birds during the day. Her home was filled with the quilts, rugs and bedspreads she made, and her garden was overflowing with the plants and flowers she collected locally from friends, neighbors and strangers. She loved good writing and poetry, especially that of Mary Oliver, Billy Collins and Edna St. Vincent Millay. A wordsmith herself, Gail was a stickler for proper grammar and concise language, entertaining many people with her humorous and clever prose.

She is survived by her daughter, Alison Wald, sister, Leslie Gabosh, brother-in-law Karl Gabosh, and her beloved cat, Milo. Gail’s son, John Wald, died in 1996.

Services will be held Monday, October 26, at 12 p.m. at the Sharon Memorial Park chapel in Sharon, MA; internment will follow. Following the service, the family will be receiving guests at the home of Wynn Calder and Phyllis Dininio at 45 Forty Acres Drive, Wayland, MA.

Donations in Gail’s memory may be made to the John Wald Ecological Endowment, The Nature Conservatory of Rhode Island, 159 Waterman Street, Providence, RI 02906–3126.”