This eulogy is in at least two parts; I am giving the first part and Toni will follow on, and there may be others, I am not sure. It suits because there is a dovetail, I heard what Toni is going to say, she passed it by me and I was amazed; really brilliant and I thought this is a perfect fit because what I am delivering seems to be less personal and more philosophical whereas Toni is delivering a number of interesting anecdotes which gives you a good picture, a good profile, of my sister Helen.

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So, in line with that, at the nursing home, again, amongst discussions between us, this was in the final days of Helen, one of the things, Marysia, John’s wife, commented on, was Helen was thinking of me; how I am going to get by when she is gone. To give you some perspective, this is a person who for more than a year was suffering from bone cancer, liver cancer, lung cancer and throat cancer. Within that time she never once complained and said “oh, why me” “oh no it hurts”; all the time she was thinking of how she could help others, especially her grandnieces and grandnephews. So, when I was thinking what I am going to say in the eulogy, I thought that is such a beautiful description; the ethos, somebody who lived this to the full, and the ethos is “others before self”.

There were a lot of things happening at the nursing home that were very revealing. Now, I was aware of Helen’s courage; Helen’s bravery in her adversity within her conditions; deteriorating and getting worse and worse and worse over time, but always thinking of others and never complaining. My perspective is only one or two people. So I think ok, maybe this happens a lot. But thanks to John’s wife, Marysia, whose vocation is in the nursing home, she gave a much better perspective because she has got great expertise; she has been working on the job for many years and her comment was “I have never seen anyone’s with Helen’s courage for what she is going through and how she is handling herself, never being a burden, always wanting to help other people in those conditions.”

So someone who has seen those conditions, so long, so many people, making that observation gives it a completely different perspective. Now the same time this was going on, there was another lady in another room and she also had cancer of some sort. All you could hear through the corridors was “”Ohhh, help me, help me” and this was continuous. And I thought it was such a poignant moment that contrasted my sister’s ethos as she was going through the same thing and she was handling herself completely differently.

Now, a little about my sister’s character; first: ‘joyful life on earth, infinite variety. There are 7.5 billion people living on earth. Of those 7.5 billion people there is not a single one that lives life identically to the other. And each in the greatest proportion, I would say at least 95 per cent, are happy with their life, very much so. I see so many examples; somebody was fighting in a war, got injured, lost his eyesight, that the change it had on him, who I hear saying, “if I had a choice I wouldn’t want to not lose my eyesight.” To put that in perspective again, if you look through history, 7.5 billion people alive now but you can extend that right through history; the infinite variety and the joy in life.

My sister was very much different to a lot of other people that you would see and the difference is this: people like variety, generally it’s more common than not, that they like variety; so if it comes to travel they might like to travel to Europe and then South America, Africa, just to get a range of cultures; they don’t like to visit the same place each time. And it’s the same with foods that you eat; or colours, everything you consider, people are quite unique. Now my sister was a person who liked predictability. She liked stability. There are very few moments, very rare moments, she was ever under stress, and those moments were always occasioned by something unexpected; so she liked doing the same thing over, over and over again.

But, as I say, another narrative that comes is that she was one of the most joyous happy people. If you look in the booklet you will see some photos, especially when she is with nieces and nephews, you will see she always has this big smile. It’s such a wonderful thing, this is one of the most wonderful moments I had, was coming down stairs from sleep, coming down in the morning, Helen was there watching television and she would greet me with this big smile. That is one of the things that I will miss forever, but thankfully, I think it was the second last day, when I was going away from a visit, I asked her for that one smile and somehow she was able to find the energy and she gave me that one smile and that I the picture I want to remember her by.

Now, the inner circle, because she didn’t like the unexpected or things that weren’t predictable, she only had a small circle of people to interrelate with, basically, it was family; there weren’t many others. But there were two others that reinforce the words I have said about happiness, happiness in her life, in the way she was living her life compared to other people; that’s a person I taught high school with, a fellow called Wally Ziemba, who arrived at the school at the same time I did.

Quite often he would come across Helen and he would interrelate with him, and Helen liked him very much. She quite often was talking about Wally. That friendship was very helpful, because when it became time to make a decision whether to stay at home or go to the nursing home, she asked me, because Wally is now in a nursing home in Berala, and she asked me “how is Wally handling the nursing home?” And I said “he’s loving it, it’s the best thing he had done in his circumstances." So this helped her, in her decision to move to Marayong where she was given around the clock care.

Wally was an American and occasionally his sister Carol would come for a holiday and she also met Helen and Helen was also very friendly with her. So out of the outer circle these are two of the people she was really friendly with. So much so that it was reciprocal, Carol would always send Helen some presents for Easter, communicate with her and at Christmas she would always get a Ronald Reagan calendar. Both Wally and Carol would often say to me “your sister is one of the happiest people we have ever come across; she is always smiling good heartedly." So that gives a picture of the character of Helen.

Now we are going to have a good dovetail here because the only thing common to what I was I thinking of saying and what Toni was saying was this: in the booklet under eulogy I have listed a number of names. What is surprising is I got a phone call from Father Patrick. Concerned that these were four people that were going to talk in the eulogy so he is thinking how long is this going to take but I informed him what the feature was about them. These people are Leslie Halliwell, Leonard Maltin, Roger Ebert, Bill Collins and Helen Molski.

When we look at those people there are a number of differences, four males, one female; one Brit, two Americans and two Australians. But it’s not the differences why I put those in; it’s what they had in common. You mightn’t be familiar with those names I am not going to reveal it, but one of those names is going to be used by Toni, so you will get the idea of what they had in common. But the thing they had in common was an encyclopaedic knowledge; they were aficionados on particular topics. Four of them are quite famous, but my sister isn’t famous but she matched all of them. As I said I will leave with the memory of Helen with the big smile I was always greeted with in the morning.

Hi I’m Toni and for those of you who don’t know me or my relationship with Helen Molski. I am her eldest niece.

I know a eulogy is a speech which helps everyone here connect to the person who has entered eternal life. I believe that the best way for you all to connect to Aunty Helen is through the memories which she created with different people in the course of her life. As the memories that she has left behind with each person help paint a picture of the person she was and not only that they help you learn new things about her that you never knew before.

Not many people knew that Aunty Helen was one half of a set of twins. Obviously they were not identical twins. But, none the less they were born on the same day - 16th of May. Her sister Mary, is my mum. So, you can imagine that when my brother and I were growing up and were excited that our mum’s birthday was close. We would always ask the question “mummy! How old are you turning this year?”. Every year without fail mums age would freeze at 36. Now, we also knew that our Aunty Helen’s birthday was coming up too - On the same day no less. So, being a child we would then go ask our Aunty Helen how old she would be turning. Guess what? She would always without fail tell us how old she was turning, I tell you what, there was an age gap of years, not minutes and they are twins?

Tom was the one who reminded me of this. But, whenever we were greeted by Aunty Helen she would always greet us kids with the best hello ever. She would always say “you little Tomek” or in my case “you little bird”. It would always be “you little” followed by our names.

My dad reminded me of this and it’s oh so true. I don’t know if you all remember “Bill Collins” he was always on TV before the old movies would come on. With his dark brown hair, big thick black glasses and is best known for presenting synopses of the old classic Hollywood Films. Well, I tell you what Aunty Helen out smarted him in this category. She could tell you everything there was to know about the old Hollywood classics; as well as, the old Hollywood actors and actresses. Like Jayne Mansfield, Marilyn Monroe, Clark Gable and Spencer Tracey just to name a few. I remember coming home from school and watching all these different old classic films with Aunty Helen.

She was one of the people who influenced me in my appreciation of different films. She was also one of the people who influenced me in the appreciation of different types of music. From Elvis, to the Bangles, the B52s, ABBA, Beach Boys and one song that specifically sticks with me is Joe Dolce’s “Shut Uppa your face”. I had the opportunity with my cousin Ania on Monday to look through my Uncle John and Ciocia Marysia’s photo collection. One of my favorite photos that we found of aunty Helen and that will stick with me always is a black and white photo of her holding a record. Because music and film was one aspect of her life that I will always remember aunty Helen for.

Aunty Helen really did like music before music became “just noise" like today. Kyle remembers a family party where a jukebox was hired. When Aunty Helen saw it, she went crazy selecting songs from the 40’s 50’s and 60’s. Aunty Helen flooded that Juke Box with all the music from that era. There were a lot of songs selected that a majority of people had no idea what they were.

One of the things I will always remember Aunty Helen for is her infectious smile and her strength. I visited her at the nursing home on one of her last days here on earth and she was a fighter to the very end. As I left, I said to Aunty Helen. “Aunty Helen Dad and I are going now. But, I want you to know that I love you very much and you take care” I wasn’t expecting a reply because she was at that stage where she couldn’t talk. But, she managed to say “I love you too”. I smiled and said “Aunty Helen you wasted your energy to tell me that. I know you love me you didn’t have to say that".

Renata had a beautiful memory of Aunty Helen, and it was a memory that touched me. It was Christmas 2014. Aunty Helen was in hospital that Christmas as she was diagnosed with cancer and required treatment. Renata came down from the Sunshine Coast to visit with Aunty Helen. Aunty Helen knew Renata was pregnant before Renata even knew. She said to Renata “Congratulations you are going to be a great mum and Matt will be a wonderful dad". Next day Renata did a pregnancy test and bam Aunty Helen was right. This story about Aunty Helen Renata intends on sharing with Jackson when he gets older.

I have to say Aunty Helen was my rock that I would lean on. She helped me so much with my two children Syrena and Alexander. She would help me by looking after them both. I am blessed that both my children got to meet her and spend quality time with Aunty Helen. My mum says that she will always remember the love and care that she had for all of her nieces, nephews and great niece and nephews. Renata, Kyle, Tomek, Ania, Syrena, Alexander, Nicholas, Lucas, Jackson and myself we all put a smile on her face and that’s a smile you will never forget.

These are just a hand full of memories which our family wanted to share. But, I am sure that you all have plenty more. So, please I encourage you all to share those memories you have of Aunty Helen around and celebrate her life with us; as our memories that we have made and continue to make are what make us both rich in life and in death.

Please view a photogallery of the late Helen Molski, her relatives and friends