Final Stretch, 17, 18 & 19. A Lady From Another Life.

When I was sixteen, I started working after school practically across the street from my high school, at Harvard Medical School. I was a type of office and research lab help in the Department of Physiology. I ran errands, washed glassware, and typed information into computer programs. Eventually, I drifted to the department's main office, where I entered invoices into Harvard's computer system, and did all types of office grunt work. 

There were two secretaries in the office, Robin and Margaret. Both were nice, though perhaps Robin, more so. The department administrator, to whom we all responded, had her office right next to the main office, and her name was Denise Zakher.

From the first, we hit it off. Margaret, the less imaginative secretary, couldn't understand how I could joke so freely with Denise. The administrator was a serious person, who did her job meticulously and got what she expected from people. At times, she could be intimidating. But I noticed a glint in her eye from the beginning that reminded me of Anne of Green Gables. In that first book, Anne Shirley speaks of "kindred spirits," people who, with one glance, know they fit in together well. 

Denise, despite her professionalism, had a sense of humor. She could see the joke in most things. She was also a lady, in every sense of the word. Every day, she was perfectly dressed, and perfectly coiffed. She never raised her voice, but got her message through forecefully, all the same, and got people to do what she wanted them to do. 

My hours, since I started at two in the afternoon, often stretched till six. My contract didn't have a fixed schedule, but since I was part-time, I could only work a maximum of four hours a day; I was paid for the hours I worked each week. Sometimes, when I stayed until six, I would chat with her after Robin and Margaret had left at five. 

She was Egyptian. I was surprised at her name, though, since Denise is not Arabic. She explained that her family was a well-to-do French-speaking Catholic family. She had attended a Catholic school, where the nuns were strict, and would only allow French to be spoken, no Arabic. So, she grew up speaking French at school and at home, and Arabic in the street. Eventually, she also learned English. It was an eye-opener to me, since I had expected Arabic to be the only language in Egypt. From then on, I called her by the French pronunciation of her name, "Derneeze".

At that time, in the late 1980's, Islamic terrorism had begun to appear. She explained to me that, if I ever heard anyone shout, "allahu akhbar", to run and take shelter. We joked, but it was a sad joke. She was saddened by the turn her country had taken. While Egypt was not a theocracy, Islam counted far more than it had years earlier, when she was young. Christians were being discriminated against, merely for the reason of their faith. People, especially women, were expected to dress modestly. She explained that that was why she and most of her brothers and sisters had emigrated. She was also saddened by the civil war in Lebanon. At that time, the mention of Beirut brought to mind bombed out ruins, and people with machine guns and rocket launchers. She explained to me that in her youth, back in the early 1950's, she and her family would visit Beirut in the summer months. It had been a beautiful city back then, and she said that it was called the Paris of the Middle East at that time. Looking at what was left of it on the nightly news, it seemed incredible to me all that had been lost.

During my time working there, her eldest daughter got married, and eventually had a baby girl. Denise said there was only one thing she didn't like about the child; her name. Her daughter had decided to give it Denise's mother's name, Elise. Denise didn't like that; she had wanted her daughter to look forward, not back. To Denise, her mother's name was too old. Still, she was enamored of her first grandchild. 

I left that job when I was twenty, and said goodbye to Denise, Robin, and Margaret. I lost track of them, especially after I moved to Spain. Some years ago, when I got internet, I typed in her name, to see if I could find something. I didn't find her, though I found her surname without any specific information. Last night, I got nostalgic, and tried again, thinking that she had probably passed away after all these years. As I had expected, I found her obituary. She passed away in 2014, at 80, after a long illness. Since the family asked for contributions to an Alzheimer's association, I assume she had been suffering from it. Even if I had found her online, she probably wouldn't have remembered me if I had written to her. I saw that she had had more grandchildren after Elise, and was glad of that. Denise absolutely loved her family.

One of the last true ladies I ever knew, and a kindred spirit, is gone. Paix à son âme.

Life continues.