By Tim O’Meilia
   
The off-duty Palm Beach County firefighter-paramedic who shot up his South Palm Beach condominium hallway and claimed a bomb had been planted may be a familiar face to town residents.
    Jean A. Pierre II, 37, was assigned to Station 38 at the Manalapan Town Hall, the station that serves South Palm Beach as well. He also had volunteered on several occasions to help with periodic free blood-pressure screening events in town.
    “I knew the guy,” said South Palm Beach Police Chief Roger Crane. “I knew him to be very professional. I knew him on a professional level.”
    Pierre, a firefighter for eight years, was arrested on three charges after the Nov. 15 incident: making a false report of a bomb, firing into a dwelling and causing property damage of more than $200. He was scheduled for a psychological evaluation following his arrest.
    No bomb was found and no one was shot or injured.
    The firefighters union issued a statement saying that Pierre had been meeting with an employee relations team “to get him the help he needs” and the union pledged to continue.
    The Palmsea condominium’s building L was evacuated for almost four hours during the incident and State Road A1A was closed between Lantana and Lake Worth roads for nearly five hours.
    Crane, Lt. Nick Alvaro and patrolman Mark McKirchy responded to a 9:52 a.m. 911 call of shots fired in the building. Pierre already had put the gun on a table when police arrived.
    “When we got off the elevator, we could still smell gunpowder in the hallway,” Crane said.
    Pierre had fired two magazines — 18 to 24 bullets — from his .40-cal. handgun through his door and the door of a neighbor.
    The bullets broke windows on the other side of the apartment. Crane said Pierre knew his neighbors were not home.
    When Pierre insisted that a bomb was going to explode, Police Chief Roger Crane called in the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office bomb squad, had the building evacuated and closed the roads.
    While bomb experts examined Pierre’s fourth-floor dwelling, some residents complained to police that they were unable to get home.
    “We wanted to err on the side of caution,” Crane said of the road closure. “I wouldn’t want to open it then close it again if we found something.”
    The incident drew backup police from Lantana, the Sheriff’s Office and Palm Beach County Fire Rescue.
    “It turned out well,” Crane said. “The people in the building are OK. There was no bomb. Any time you come out of these when no one’s injured, it’s a good day.”

Pamela Murphy has two hobbies that she loves: cooking and exercising. It really does make a good combination. When you put it on, you just take it off.
    Here’s some background on Pam: She’s been coming to Florida for years, attracted to the warm weather and the beaches. She and her husband, John, owned a vacation condo in Palm Beach and as their children got older, the Murphys found themselves able to spend more time here, and ended up buying their home in Manalapan eight years ago.
    Then, four years ago, Pam retired. She was the vice president of operations in her husband’s school bus business in Middletown, N.J.
    “That really was a success story,” she said. “He started out with one bus and ended up with more than 500 when he sold it four years ago.”
    At that point, she was really able to transition to Florida, spending almost the entire year here — John still goes back and forth. He has another business, Murphy Enterprises, a taxi and limousine company in New Jersey, and she said, “He’s got a Friday night poker game he won’t give up.”
    So, finally, she had the time to indulge herself in her cooking and exercising.
    First thing she did was join a gym in Plaza Del Mar, where she enjoyed the camaraderie, as well as the fact that she was seeing and feeling immediate results.
    “I’m not a gym rat,” she said. “But I loved going to the gym. I went every morning and did the weight circuit and boxing. I had never done this kind of thing before and I saw results. I looked better. I felt better. My blood pressure was lower because of the exercise.
    “The more toned I became, the more I went shopping and bought new clothes. You start seeing results, and who doesn’t like to shop?”
    But soon after, the gym closed, and for the three following years, she exercised sporadically.
    “I said to my husband, ‘I miss the gym. I miss the gym.’ And he got tired of listening to me and said, ‘So, go open one.’ ”
    So, in October, she did just that. She named it “The Gym” and she opened it at the same location as her old gym in Plaza Del Mar. It’s two floors and 8,000 square feet. She purchased top-of-the-line equipment, hired her trainer to manage the facility, as well as a nutritionist and various other instructors for a whole host of classes, with big plans for senior classes, ballroom and line dancing, and whatever else she can think of that’s fun. And she’s back in business. And exercising.
    Except that she broke her leg.
    “I roll through there and look at my equipment,” she said.
    Good thing she has other hobbies. There’s the cooking — she said she could easily be a caterer — and she likes to needlepoint.
    But it won’t be long before she’s exercising again. “One of my neighbors said that most people join a gym. They don’t buy one.” Talk about commitment to looking good and being healthy.
    That’s Pam.

— Christine Davis

10 QUESTIONS

   Q. Where did you grow up and go to school? How do you think that has influenced you?
    A. I grew up in Bay Village, Ohio, a small close-knit community that made me appreciate the value of friendship. I’m still in touch with friends and it still feels like home. I went to school at Ohio University.

    Q.  What inspired you to open a gym?  How long have you had the business?
    A. I got tired of seeing the Plaza with empty stores and I missed having a gym close to home. The Plaza is like the center of town and I wanted it to thrive.

   Q. What’s your favorite part of the work you do?
    A. Meeting people and helping them achieve their goals.

   Q. What other careers have you had, what were the highlights? 
    A.  I was trained as a teacher. I’ve had a pizza franchise and worked with my husband in his school bus company. It grew to be the largest in New Jersey. Contact with various people was the common thread in all.

    Q. What is your favorite part about living and working in Manalapan? 
    A. The people. We all seem to be at a stage in life where what you see is what you get. No one needs to prove anything.

   Q. What book are you reading now?        

   A. I like to read cookbooks, especially those that were part of a local fundraising effort. They give an insight into what different parts of the country are like and the women behind the recipes.

    Q. What music do you listen to when you need inspiration? When you want to relax? 
    A. Old Bob Dylan and Anne Murray.
   
   Q. Do you have a favorite quote that inspires your decisions? 
    A.  “If you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain.” — Dolly Parton
   
   Q.  Have you had mentors in your life? Individuals who have inspired your life decisions?
    A. My dad. He was a soft-spoken man who instilled family values and kindness to others. I wish he had lived long enough to see me now.

   Q. Who or what makes you laugh?
    A. My daughter Rachel. She has a quick wit and can mimic anyone with great accuracy.

By Liz Best

    DELRAY BEACH — Doris Asiel Meyer died peacefully at her Delray Beach home on Nov. 5. She was 96 years old.
    She left her hometown of New York City, where she worked in former Mayor John Lindsay’s administration, for the sunny shores of Delray Beach in the late 1970s. Mrs. Meyer quickly made her presence known in the community here. She was well known for her small stature and king-sized heart.
    Dr. Ted Bush, retired minister of First Presbyterian Church of Delray Beach, knew Mrs. Meyer as both a friend and church member for the better part of the past 20 years.
    “Doris was petite,” he said. “But she had tremendous insight and vision and could see beyond what was in front of her to see the bigger picture.”
    This trait was never more obvious than when Bush’s son, Teddy, died at age 23 of a brain tumor. Mrs. Meyer wanted to do something in honor of Teddy besides just making a donation to an organization, so she combined Teddy’s love of baseball with her desire to do something lasting in his memory. Teddy’s Field was born.
    Originally located in the Carver Estates public housing project, Teddy’s Field was the brainchild of Mrs. Meyer and the Bush family. In 2001, they found a neglected baseball field on Southwest 12th Avenue, and Mrs. Meyer donated $16,000 to renovate the field and turn it into a ballpark for the neighborhood children. Hurricane Wilma damaged the area so badly that Teddy’s Field had to be relocated to its current location at Pompey Park.
    According to Bush, Mrs. Meyer’s attitude was simply, “Let’s do it. Dorrie made it possible to put down a field … and it gives a lot of kids a chance to play baseball who wouldn’t be able to otherwise,” he said.
    Even though Mrs. Meyer’s health had deteriorated, she managed to visit the ballpark she built. Bush and his wife accompanied her on one of these visits and watched in amazement as children and parents approached her to say thank you. She then sat in the dugout talking with the young ballplayers while eating a hot dog.
    “She could be comfortable with anybody, whether it was influential people or those kids in the dugout,” said Bush.
    Her son, Bob Gimbel of New York City sums up his mother’s life like this: “She was a spunky lady (who) wasn’t afraid to stand up and speak her mind, and she had incredible intuition,” he said. “And she had a great sense of humor.”
    Mrs. Meyer loved to play golf and she loved dogs.          Gimbel said his mom played golf well into her nineties. He also said every neighborhood dog knew when she was taking her daily walk because she always had treats for them in her pockets.
    Mrs. Meyer served as a nurse’s aid during World War II, and graduated from both Knox College in Cooperstown, N.Y., and Finch College in New York City. During the turbulent 1960s, Mrs. Meyer worked as a liaison for the New York State Federation of Republican Women.
    Mrs. Meyer was preceded in death by her husband, Blakeman Q. Meyer. Along with her son and his wife, Despina Gimbel, survivors include three grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.
    A funeral service, led by Bush, was held at the First Presbyterian Church. The family asks that memorial donations be made to Teddy’s Field, c/o the City of Delray Beach Parks and Recreation Department, 100 NW First Ave., Delray Beach, FL 33444.

By Emily J. Minor
   
BRINY BREEZES — Marguerite Sanford, who began coming to Briny Breezes with her mother back in 1954 and was considered somewhat of a matriarch in Briny’s graying neighborhood family, died Oct. 27 during a visit to her daughter’s home in Tennessee. She was 101.
Mrs. Sanford’s daughter, Anita Coe, said her mother had been in a rehab center for a non-life threatening injury, and developed complications.           The middle of three children, and the only girl, Mrs. Sanford was born June 20, 1910, in Fort Smith, Ark., and quickly developed a love for the arts — despite her rural upbringing.
    “She was very active in music and played the piano,” said her daughter. “She also sang light opera around Memphis — where they wore the costumes and everything.”
    A 1929 graduate of St. Agnes Academy, Mrs. Sanford later attended nursing school at Saint Thomas Hospital in Memphis. In 1938, she married Dr. James Eddy Coe, a family doctor, and she gave up nursing to stay home with the children.
    Coe’s brother, James Eddy Coe Jr., of Trinity, Texas, also survives her, along with four grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.
    Dr. Coe died in 1969, and by this time Mrs. Sanford was already making the trip south to Briny Breezes each year, their Spartan travel trailer in tow. At one time, Mrs. Sanford had said her mother had bought 23 Briny shares in 1958, and that she’d paid about $2,500.
    In 1974, she married George Sanford, also a Briny resident, and the couple shared many interests — including traveling, square dancing and a little something called “round dancing,”said Anita Coe.
    Round dancing is like ballroom dancing, except with a caller, and each summer the Sanfords would go to an annual round-dancing convention in Kentucky, Coe said.
    Her mother, she said, also loved quilting, needlepoint and smocking, and she was a heck of a shuffleboard player. Mr. Sanford died in 1991.
    Through the years, Briny residents embraced Mrs. Sanford as their very own mother figure, if you will, even orchestrating a detailed, yet beautifully simple, meal-delivery system that almost always meant Mrs. Sanford had a healthy dinner, every night, with plenty left over for lunch the next day, Coe said.
    “They always say you live longer if you’re happy,” Coe said, “and we have attributed the greater part of mama’s living longer to the people in Briny.”
    Briny Breezes Mayor Roger Bennett said he used to love it when the phone would ring and it would be Mrs. Sanford, informing him she “needed a man” to help with something.
    “I’d go over there and check out her floor, or whatever, and then I’d open a bottle of wine for her,” Bennett said.
    Neighbor Edith Lougheed said she and her husband, Jack, loved it when Mrs. Sanford felt well enough to fling open her door and join them in the evenings for a Briny sunset.
    “She had an excellent sense of humor and always entertained us,” she said. “We were always so happy to see her.”
Funeral services were held Nov. 4 at St. Ann’s Catholic Church in Bartlet, Tenn.

By Rich Pollack

Dave Spitzer knew the time had come to start car shopping.
    The owner of Old Vines Wine & Spirits in Delray Beach, Dave and his wife had two old cars, both beyond their prime.
    But when he started thinking about it, Spitzer decided that instead of plunking down $20,000 or more for a new sedan, he would spend a third of that on a golf cart.
    Not an ordinary golf cart, mind you, but one that was modified to be street legal — or what is classified officially by the state as a “low-speed vehicle or mini-truck.”
    “I had seen some around town and though it was a good idea,” Spitzer said. “Before we had the cart, one of the cars was just sitting in the garage all the time.”
    Throughout out Palm Beach County, including several coastal communities, more and more people are thinking a street-legal and battery-powered modified golf cart — with a maximum speed of 35 mph — is a good idea.
    For some, like Noreen Papatheodorou and her husband, Christos, the Club Car enhanced golf cart they received as a gift from their son a few years ago is perfect for getting around their Point Manalapan neighborhood or for going for a ride to the nearby Plaza Del Mar shopping center with their bichon, Beau.
    For others, like Benita and Jordon Goldstein, owners of the historic Hartman House bed and breakfast in Delray Beach, having a zero-emissions vehicle is good for business, especially when it comes to taking guests to the beach or dropping them off at a downtown restaurant.
And while avoiding high gas prices is another reason to put the cart before the horsepower, most of those who drive an electric golf cart of one kind or another will tell you there’s a single attribute that trumps all others.
    “It’s a lot of fun,” says Noreen Papatheodorou, adding that the cart — which she calls “one of the jazziest around” — is a conversation piece, often sparking chats with neighbors.
    In Delray, along Atlantic Avenue and in the Pineapple Grove Arts District, the low-speed vehicles are also gaining traction among those who just want to visit a neighborhood store or get a cup of coffee at one of the outdoor cafes.
    “It’s a very friendly way of traveling,” says Marjorie Ferrer, executive director of the city’s Downtown Development Authority. “It just fits well with Delray Beach because we’re a very sociable city.”
    So much so, in fact, that Delray Beach may be on the cutting edge, with the Pineapple Grove Arts board teaming up with the owner of Delray Camera shop to create the area’s first golf-cart-only parking spot.
    “Pineapple Grove attracts golf carts because it’s a neighborhood-type destination with neighborhood stores,” says Gene Fisher, president of the arts board.
    The area, along with downtown Delray Beach, is also attracting golf carts because, for the most part, traffic moves a little more slowly there than it does in other places in the city.
    Under Florida law, the low-speed vehicles are not permitted on roads with speed limits above 35 and must have everything from a windshield to headlights and taillights. Seat belts, a rearview mirror and a parking brake are also mandatory.
    By law, the carts you see on the road, complete with license plates, go far beyond the typical carts you would find at the neighborhood golf course.
    The electric vehicle that the Goldsteins of the Hartman House drive, for example, is called a GEM and it is a four-seater, with the unique attribute of having all four seats facing forward.
The GEM, which sells for about $11,000 new and about half of that used, also has a storage compartment perfect for hauling groceries.
    Spitzer has found that his cart is also good for making deliveries in the area and for going out for a Sunday drive.
    “I love it,” he says. “It’s so much fun that I make excuses to drive it to work.”                 Ú

The 12th Annual Bethesda Hospital Foundation Women of Grace Luncheon was held Nov. 9 at The Ritz-Carlton in Manalapan. Pictured (from left) are volunteer honorees Peggy Martin, Connie Siskowski and Linda Gunn with co-chair Michelle Donahue, mistress of ceremonies Suzanne Boyd, co-chair Patty Jones and volunteer honorees Pamela Avalos and Nilsa McKinney.  The event benefited Bethesda’s Center for Women and Children. Photo provided

The Kumar family, Maya (front left) and Maddox with their parents Angela and Roger attend the Gulf Stream School Parent/Child Golf Tournament at St. Andrews Club on Nov. 5.  Photo provided

Organizers of the 9th Annual Holiday Trunk Show supporting the Naoma Donnelley Haggin Boys & Girls Club cheer a group of children as they perform Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer at a preview reception held at the Seagate Hotel in Delray Beach on Nov. 29.  Photo by Jerry Lower

By Emily J. Minor

    GULF STREAM — Ethel Sloan Allen, the consummate Great Gatsby girl whose coming out as a debutante was much ballyhooed by the famous New York gossip writer, Cholly Knickerbocker, died Oct. 26 at her home in Gulf Stream. She was 92.    “She really was the end of an era,” said her daughter, Renee Allen Rand.
Born in Washington, D.C., Mrs. Allen was the daughter of Col. and Mrs. Thomas Donaldson Sloan. The couple reared their six children on Long Island, where Mrs. Allen attended the Lawrence School in Hewlett, N.Y.
    Nicknamed “Bam,” Mrs. Allen made her coming out in 1937. Reading from a yellowed clipping, Rand said Knickerbocker wrote at the time that her mother dressed in a “rather exotic manner” and that she lit up a room with her “hearty laugh.”
    And while some descriptions in the old social column seemed a bit off-center, Rand said it was certainly true that her mother’s laugh was unmistakable.
    “She really did have the most incredible laugh,” her daughter said. “You could always easily find her in a room by her laugh.”
    Along with her sense of style, beauty and grace, Mrs. Allen had a rather historic family background. A descendent of the Mayflower settlers, Mrs. Allen was a member of the Colonial Dames of America and the Daughters of the American Revolution. She was also the great-great-granddaughter of Gen. Rene de Russy, Harvard class of 1812, a prominent Army general for whom five U.S. forts were named.
    Mrs. Allen attended the American School of Design in New York City, and kept her magnificent sense of style and grace all through her years.
    “She had a style all her own,” Rand said. “Even in her 70s and 80s, people would turn and look when she walked into a room.”
    Mrs. Allen was married several times, and began coming to Gulf Stream with her husband at the time in the mid-1970s.
The couple joined the Gulf Stream Bath & Tennis Club, and Rand remembers when all the grown-ups used to “sit around the pool, enjoying the evenings, with their cocktails.
    “The club was a huge part of their lives back then,” she said.
    Although Mrs. Allen was well enough last spring to travel north to escape the Florida summer, Rand said her mother had grown increasingly more fragile in recent months. She died just a few weeks after returning to Florida, in the home where she had first begun staying in 1976.
    In addition to Rand, who lives in Sugar Grove, N.C., Mrs. Allen is survived by a second daughter, Evelyn Sloan O’Neil, of Golf, Fla., and six grandchildren.
A memorial service will be held in North Carolina, but no date has been set.

Lisa White (left), Sylvie Bergeron, Stephanie Kahlert and Nancy Zarcadoolas attend the Bethesda Foundation’s Magnolia Society Tea Nov. 2 at the Delray Beach Club in support of the Women of Grace Luncheon. In eight years, the Magnolia Society has grown to 150 members. Photo provided

By Steve Pike

    Wanda Krowlikowski remembers well her interview for the head golf professional’s job at The Little Club in Gulf Steam.
    “I was at a nice table in the dining room with board members looking out on the golf course,” Krowlikowski said. “They asked me if I thought I would be happy here. I answered, ‘What’s not to like?’ ’’
    Indeed, The Little Club is one of the state’s top par-three golf courses, featuring a Paspalum grass playing surface and two holes — the 11th and 12th — that back up to the Intracoastal Waterway and a 300-membership roll (approximately 150 of whom are golfers) that includes legendary golf course architect Pete Dye and his wife, Alice.
    What’s not to like? The club’s board members thought the same thing about Krowlikowski. They hired her from a pool of 55 applicants on April 1, 2008.
    “I think they like my enthusiasm,” said Krowlikowski,  a member of the LPGA and PGA of America.  “I wasn’t  looking to change what they had here. This is a pretty old club and members don’t like a lot of change. I was happy about that.”
    Happy particularly because, until that April 2008, Krowlikowski had led the nomadic professional life of a lot of golf professionals. That is, moving from club to club and course to course every few years. In Krowlikowski’s case, that movement was in the Boca Raton-Delray Beach area. One of four children from a golfing family in Pennsylvania, Krowlikowski first came to the area to attend Marymount College (now Lynn University) in 1974 and, except for a few summers, never left.
    “I had aspirations of getting on the mini tour,” said Krowlikowski, 55. “Then in 1979 I got a job as an assistant at Delair Country Club (in Delray Beach). Actually I was a shop girl. I worked there for seven years and the got my first head professional’s job at Boca Teeca (now Ocean Breeze) in 1987. I went back and forth to Pennsylvania to teach in the summer and came back down here in the winter.”
    Krowlikowski has also worked at Stonebridge Golf and Country Club in Boca Raton, Wycliffe Country Club in Lake Worth and the American Golfers Club in Fort Lauderdale. That now-closed facility featured an executive golf course, nine-hole pitch and putt and a lighted driving range.
    “I’ve been at just about every kind of facility — private, semi-private, public, executive. Now a par 3. This is something different all together. We only play between 7,000 and 8,000 rounds per year,” Krowlikowski said.
    “I enjoy it here. It’s a less hectic pace. That’s just what I need at my age.”
    What’s not to like?         

Volunteers gather with hand-made holiday items in the Fellowship Hall at First Presbyterian Church in Delray Beach on Nov. 12.  The church’s Holiday Craft Sale continues 10 am-3 pm Tuesdays and Saturdays through Dec. 17 at the church’s Bronson House, 33 Gleason Street. For information, call 276-6338. Photo by Jerry Lower

Bethesda Healthcare System President and CEO Robert Hill (l), with LPGA greats and Pro-Am Hosts Meg Mallon and Beth Daniel and Bethesda Executive Vice President Roger Kirk at the 2011 Bethesda Pro-Am Golf Tournament. The 2012 Pro-Am will be held Jan. 16 at Pine Tree Golf & Country Club. Foursomes are available for $6,000. Joining Daniel and Mallon to play are Nancy Lopez, Bob Murphy, Christina Kim, Stacy Lewis, Jay Sigel, Angela Stanford and more. 9 am registration and breakfast and 11 am shotgun start followed by cocktail reception and silent auction. Golf event is free to the public. For information, call 737-7733, ext. 5600. Photo provided

Coastal Star food writer, Jan Norris, lists restaurants and places serving turkey (and vegetarian) on Thursday. Check it out at:

http://www.jannorris.com/thanksgiving-recipes/thanksgiving-dinner-restaurants-serving-turkey-or-vegetarian-in-2011/

Happy Thanksgiving!

The management of The Coastal Star would like to congratulate the accomplished writers and photographers who help us produce an impressive, award-winning newspaper. Several of them were recognized at the Florida Press Club Awards in St. Petersburg this past weekend.
Please congratulate the following award winners:

1st Place: Feature Photography — Tim Stepien: timstepien@earthlink.net
1st Place: ...Light Feature Writing — Ron Hayes: ronnieron50@bellsouth.net
1st Place: Minority Reporting — C.B. Hanif: cbhanif@gmail.com
2nd Place: Government News Writing — Steve Plunkett: plunk99@msn.com
2nd Place: Light Feature Writing — Emily J. Minor: emilyjminor@aol.com
2nd Place: Portrait/Personality Photography — Tim Stepien
3rd Place: General News Writing - Tim O'Meilla: timomeilia@gmail.com

Congratulations!

Mary Kate

Stan Smith of Lake Worth puts finishing touches on the public art installation of ‘The Gulf Stream’ by local artist Frank Varga prior to the Oct. 26 opening of Walmart at Gulfstream Boulevard and Federal Highway in Boynton Beach.
Photos by Jerry Lower

First, on behalf of my mom, thank you all so much for coming. You all meant a lot to her.

We’re all here to remember and celebrate the life of a great woman. A woman who had a passion for duckpin bowling. A woman who enjoyed pina coladas. A woman who really dug Elvis Presley. And a woman who made a mean meatloaf.

But what we all think of first when we think of my mom is her kind spirit, which I think is best reflected in a few stories.

When I started working as a newspaper reporter, I would often send her articles I had written. She had kept them all, I found out later. But at the time, I often wondered whether she really read them or whether she sometimes got bored with them. After all, how many stories about a city council could one person stand?

Eventually, my mom started keeping up with my articles on the Web. One day, I was on the phone with her and she said, “You haven’t written much lately. Why not?” And I said, “I’ve been writing! I’ve written like four articles this week!” And she said, “Yeah, but they were all really short!”

My mom had not only enjoyed reading stuff I’d written. She wanted more — not because she was interested in the petty politics or the monotonous court cases. Just because they were written by her son.

She lived for me and my brother. And for her family. Always providing for us and trying to steer us in the right direction.

Sometimes, though, her lessons were not entirely truthful.

My niece, Amanda, loves watermelon, just like my mom. And the two of them would often share one on hot summer nights.

Amanda, though, sometimes wasn’t careful about not eating the seeds. So my mom would tell her, “Amanda, if you eat the seeds, a watermelon’s gonna grow in your stomach!”

Her older brother Daniel would try to tell Amanda, on the sly, that no such thing would happen to her. But she thought Daniel was just trying to trick her into having a watermelon grow in her belly, and would not believe him.

Amanda knew my mom was her protector. And she was going to side with her. And Amanda never did choke on a watermelon seed.

Protecting. Giving. It’s what my mom did. She did not have much. But she still found a way to give and give.

As my mom’s health worsened and she became forgetful, she managed to keep on giving.

After I was engaged in early 2009 to my wife Jen, I was eager to have my mom at the wedding and dance with her to “Love Me Tender.” We did. Her health declined a short time later. But she had given me my dance.

But I still needed more time with her. I knew we would be having a baby. And I wanted desperately for my mom to see her new grandchild. But I thought that was unthinkable.

Again, though, my mom stayed strong. And in March, my wife gave birth to our son Quinn and my mom got to meet him. And see the little chunker balloon to 23 pounds.

I have to think that my mom was holding on long enough to share these milestones with me. These were two final, wonderful gifts.

I hope that my mom leaves us all with more than memories. I hope she leaves us with a model to follow. It is a high standard and one that I often find it hard to match.

She did not judge. She accepted. She did not complain. She worked. She did not resent. She loved. She did not take. She gave.

Thanks, Mom. For everything. I love you. We all love you.

By Mary Jane Fine

These are the Mother Hubbard days. In homes all-too-familiar with hunger and homes new to that terror, cupboards are bare. The use of food stamps has quadrupled in Florida over the past four lean years, according to published reports, with 161,250 of this year’s recipients from Palm Beach County — nearly 22,000 more than last year. Once-comfortable families bury their shame and visit food pantries now. More hot meals go out to the homebound. Giving organizations can only hope — especially now, with Thanksgiving just weeks away — that the haves keep contributing enough to help the have-nots.

Meet C.R.O.S. Ministries, Community Caring Center and Boca Helping Hands.

Help us help others
The Coastal Star and Microgiving.com have joined forces to provide an online means for monetary donations to the featured non-profit organizations providing home delivery of food to the elderly and needy in our community.  Both of our locally owned and operated companies are committed to giving back to our communities. Our hope is you will join us, by making an online donation at:
Boca Helping Hands: www.microgiving.com/profile/jgavrilos
Community  Caring Center: www.microgiving.com/profile/sherryccc
C.R.O.S. Ministries: www.microgiving.com/profile/caringkitchen1

By Mary Jane Fine

Only a year ago, the food pantry at Boca Helping Hands distributed 500 bags of groceries each month to those in need. This year, they hand out 2,000 bags a month. Only a year ago, the soup kitchen served 2,200 lunches of, say, pot roast or turkey or stew each month. This year, that number exceeds 3,900 meals a month. Twice a week, hard times or not, groceries are delivered to the homebound in 21 homes.
“Grocery bags on steroids,” is what executive director Jim Gavrilos calls them. “We’re trying to get permits to deliver, Monday through Friday, the hot meal we serve Monday through Saturday in the kitchen.” He hopes the permits are only about a month away now.
As for the increased pantry distributions, the additional soup-kitchen servings, he says, “Clearly, it’s because of the economic downturn. What we’re seeing is middle-class people, people who’ve been out of work for six months, nine months, a year. At a certain point, it becomes a matter of survival.”
Program director Sally Wells thinks of the woman with two teenage daughters who lost their home to foreclosure after her ex-husband lost his job and, with it, his ability to pay child-support and alimony. The woman had a job for a while but, when it ended, what money she’d saved soon ran out.
“All their stuff was in storage, and they needed a week’s worth of shelter while she looked for work again,” says Wells, who is married to Gavrilos. “It’s hard for people to come in here and face the fact that they need help.” Boca Helping Hands gave them a temporary home at a motel on Federal Highway.
The hands that do the helping here belong to five staffers and 300 volunteers: They oversee the soup kitchen; the food pantry; the groceries delivered to the homebound; the “Blessings in a Backpack” program that sends home a weekend’s worth of meals and snacks for the 1,200 grade school children eligible for the federal free-lunch program; the classes on budgeting and job-seeking; the resource center that offers aid to people facing eviction or utility cancellation or in need of prescription medication.
The group’s mission — once aimed primarily at the government-subsidized housing areas of Pearl City and Dixie Manor in eastern Boca — has expanded, recently, into the city’s western reaches. “We just began distributing (grocery bags) at Boca Glades Baptist Church,” says Wells. “People have transportation problems or no money for gas. A hundred bags a week. And it’s growing.”
School-based food drives, individuals, corporations, entities as diverse as Boca Raton Regional Hospital and Whole Foods, donate to Boca Helping Hands, which began in 1998. The group was the inspiration of a half-dozen or so people, both Christians and Jews, says Gavrilos, an ex-priest.
“We do what we can,” says Wells. “As soon as food comes into our warehouse, it goes out. We definitely need donations.”

Boca Helping Hands
1500 NW First Court, Boca Raton
417-00913
www.bocahelpinghands.org or through Coastal Star/Microgiving fundraising effort:  www.microgiving.com/profile/jgavrilos
Needs: Check the website. ($25 pays for up to 10 hot meals served in the Food Center; $100 will supply seven families with a bag of groceries; $1,000 will help feed 20 homebound clients for one month or pay rent for one family).