Today my mother, who died in 2003, would have been 100 years old. I thought about her while dodging rain drops out on my morning jog, as I have been the last couple of weeks as March 19 approached.

She’s been known as “Nan” so long (30 plus years, since son John shortened Nana) that I’ve forgotten what I called her. I guess it was “Mom” and “Mommy” before that. To my father and her devoted husband, she was Ede (with an “e” but not an “i”.) And  to my teenage friends “E.”

I, of course, didn’t know her in her jaunty, coquettish youth (as picttured) – I didn’t enter her life until she was her her late 30s. From what my father said, she was “a catch.” Dating during the Depression, they would walk home from work together – from the Financial District to the Sunset. The story was that they saved money so that they could buy an ice cream.

Not that they were teetotalers. Before I entered they’re life, the would play golf all day, party all night, and tee off at dawn.

Me and moving to Menlo Park changed all that. My mother was the quintessential mom – PTA volunteer, Girl Scout leader, homemaker, baker of superb chocolate chip cookies and brownies. All my friends liked coming to E’s house.

I don’t think I ever said “thanks.” She was just “being a Mom” in my mind. But I do know I was darn lucky. Chris put together a nice tribute on gulker.com at the time of her death…