Salomeja Valukiene, RIP

"Sally" Valukiene and her husband, Vytas Valukas, were great friends of my in-laws, as well as of Vaiva.  I believe that at the time of Vaiva's death, Valukiene was in Lithuania tending to her dying husband.  After she returned to New Haven, she lived in the York Towers. Sometime in 2009 or 2010 I made a printed copy of this blog, and I lent it to her as she did not have computer access.  After she read it, I spent an afternoon with her in her apartment, and if I'm not mistaken Sigita Rosen was there also.

I did not know that Valukiene moved to the Matulaitis nursing home last April.

On Thursday, my colleague at Merrill Anderson, Peter O'Connell, brought me an obituary from the New Haven Register.  It was for Valukiene, who had died the previous Monday.  Peter had no idea that I knew her, let alone that she was a great friend of the family.  He saw her accomplishments in the Lithuanian community, and guessed it might interest me.  I would link to the obituary, but I can't find it on the Register's site, I only find a correction that was made to it.

The obit revealed that the funeral would be the next day, in Putnam, at 10:30.  The coincidences were too much, I figured that God wanted me to go to that funeral, so I did.

It was a small ceremony, some Lithuanian, some English.  She was cremated, and the little box of ashes was rolled into the chapel on a small table.  It was like old times for me, like the Latin mass of my childhood which I also could not understand.  The small chorus of older women was quite striking.  It was a somber moment, yet hardly tragic, she lived 97 years after all.

I had not planned on attending the internment, but it was just up the road at the Immaculate Conception Convent, the Lithuanian nunnery.  I did not know that the name of the burial ground there is Gate of Heaven Cemetery.  It was a lovely autumn day, it is a very spiritual place.  After the ashes were placed in the ground, after everyone had a chance to drop some sand on the box, we had lunch with the nuns.

I'm not certain, but I think I was the youngest person there.

Here are the photos I took at the services.