Lillian Sonderling

Widow of her beloved Arthur and loving mother to sons Edward and Harlan, daughter-in-law Bethany, and grandchildren Ezra, Eliana, Aria, Boaz, and Layla, she leaves us with a warm legacy of family, action, and affection. Please direct any charitable gifts to Hadassah, the Women's Zionist Organization of America.

We honor, mourn, and celebrate Lillian Cohen Sonderling, beloved granddaughter, daughter, sister, niece, cousin, aunt, wife, mother, mother-in-law, grandmother, great, great great, and great great great aunt, and friend. She is being laid to rest beside her husband Arthur and among his family. Her parents, Esther and Edward Cohen, and maternal aunts, Rose and Betty, are interred at Cypress Hills Cemetery in Queens; her brothers Seymour and Clifford rest in California. She is predeceased by two nephews, Warren Mitofsky and Gary Cane; and, in late August, her niece Lenore Levy. Arthur’s Uncle Joe, one of two sons, five children, of Lena and Israel Sonderling, purchased this plot in 1933 and was the first interred here. Here lie Arthur, his parents, three uncles, sister, brother-in-law, nephew, for whom we have placed stones, and, finally, his wife.

Who among the living is not with us today? Grandson Boaz, granddaughter Layla, nephews David and Robert Cane and niece Elise, and other family and younger friends and caregivers.

As we address Lillian’s mortality today, we celebrate her vitality. Truly, while alive, she lived!

President James A. Garfield wrote “There is nothing in all the earth that you can do for the Dead. They are past our help and past our praise. We can add to them no glory, we can give to them no immortality. They do not need us, but forever and forever more we need them.” That’s mother, who nearly doubled President Garfield’s lifespan, born on the sesquicentennial and alive for 40% of our nation’s existence, outliving her beloved Arthur by a quarter century and a day, whom she served with special devotion in his 86th and final year, what I called her moment of greatness. The morning after her death, the most tears were shed by her caregivers, who lost their favorite resident.

Lillian was reared in humble circumstances, and she knew struggle and privation. This endowed her with appreciation, sensitivity, and understanding of life that led to compassion, gentleness, and deep loving concern. She comforted her widowed mother at 23 and never stopped looking after her. She was also clever enough to have three birthdays a year, giving her boyfriends more opportunities to spoil her. She came home from New Years 1957 to say, “Mom, I’m getting married this year,” and in response to Grandma Esther’s question to whom, she said, “I don’t know yet.” Arthur won the prize, as, of course, I did with Bethany. They made their family, and, as Dad liked to say, “we had, we did, we went.” They’d invested, she said, in schools, not jewels. They taught us to love, to accept love, to learn, to work. She made frequent charitable gifts focused on children, veterans, and Jewish causes. She touched people, many of whom, cousins Fran and Barbara reminded me yesterday, viewed her as glamorous. She made us better.

Ed and I, in hindsight but even then, could do little wrong. She loved without condition, trusted us, and encouraged us to do what we wanted for ourselves and, in later years, to serve Arthur and her. Where do you children think I got this whole “self-styled dad who can’t say no” routine? Loved her husband and children and grandchildren. She stood by us, and we by her; they taught us to live, and, finally, to grow old. Lillian was a breast cancer survivor at 53 and a Florida resident at 57.

Ed and I remember her love of putting pedal to metal in her canary yellow 1968 Cadillac coupe, including two early 1970s road trips to Florida. She loved travel of all sorts, and Dad and Mom took us places, enabled us to love travel, and traveled far every year after we left the house. After giving up driving at 88 – her limousine-like sedan is present today – Lillian liked riding in front with Uber drivers, as she would have ridden up front today if heavenly possible. She made friends easily. She had jewels and lovely furs and liked Broadway and the ballet and the opera and restaurants and the country clubs in summer. She volunteered with Hadassah and ORT.

She enjoyed day-to-day news and accomplishments of her children and grandchildren and daily wished us well and called us wonderful. She was good at mah jong and bridge, and an expert canasta player. We joke that they moved from Boca to Delray so mom could find a better game. Lillian had expansive horizons into her 90s and bounced back from all ailments, about none of which she ever complained. Lillian wrote this to her Vi at Lakeside Village community after a hospitalization:

To my dear friends and neighbors:

Care and concern for one another never go out of style, and I am grateful to you all for your kind deeds and words over the past year, one during which the years have attempted to catch up with me. Simply knowing that I could and can count on you, truly my extended family, has given me enormous strength to endure and recover from my physical trials. I am fortunate every day to be among you and to live in such fine surroundings. My gratitude brings happiness, and my happiness brings improved health. With best wishes always, Lillian Sonderling

On August 18, 1791, exactly 123 years before Arthur’s birthday, President Washington said to the Newport, Rhode Island, rabbi, “May the father of all mercies scatter light, and not darkness, upon our paths, and make us all in our several vocations useful here, and in His own due time and way everlastingly happy.” Lillian lit our way.

In the rising of the sun and its going down, we remember you, Lillian. As long as we live, you, too, shall live, for now you are a part of us as we remember you and serve your memory.

God who is full of compassion, dwelling on high

Grant perfect peace to the soul of Lillian Sonderling.

May she rest under the wings of Your Presence

Holy and Pure, Who shines bright as the sky.

And may her place of rest be as Eden.

We pledge charity for the sake of her memory.

May God bless her and keep her and watch over her.

May she rest in peace. “May God comfort you with all the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.”