Dear Hanie and Suri,

As you know, the other night, Nicole and I went out with two of Nancy’s co-workers from Tzell Travel, Marvelys and Lena. While Marvelys is still collecting her thoughts, I wanted to relay a few stories they told that I thought you’d appreciate.

In general, they kept saying they had never learned so much about Judaism as they did from working with Nancy. She’d explain when they’d go together on those trips abroad she couldn’t use electricity or ride from “sundown Friday to sundown Saturday.” Marvelys said when they went to London; she was laughing how Nancy kept her “chicken on ice in the bathtub,” because she had to bring her own food (and we all know how important chicken was to Nancy). Also, in London, there was a huge dinner in a hotel far from where they were staying, like a mile and a half on Saturday and of course, everyone else was driving and Nancy insisted on walking because Shabbos wasn’t over yet, so Marvelys said, “Well, I’m not letting you walk alone for over a mile,” so they walked together in the freezing cold.

Then, on another night, Nancy dragged Marvelys all over London looking for kosher food and finally she got yogurt. Marvelys said by then it was so late, that all the places where Marvelys could eat were closed!

Marvelys said she would always try to talk Nancy out of going to visit Israel, because she feared the danger there. But Nancy would always say as a Jew she feels 1,000 times safer there.

They described how incredibly hard she worked in the travel office. Whereas Marvelys would quote a rate for a flight to a client, she’d say, “The price is $500, take it or leave it,” Nancy would bend over backwards and make a hundred phone calls and spend the next three days trying to get that client’s airfare down to $300 and then the clients would give her a hard time about the travel agency’s $20 commission!

Marvelys always looked forward coming to work and hearing Nancy’s entertaining biking and skiing stories. It sounds like they were very close. They spoke a few times a day regarding Timmy’s travel arrangements and then at home on personal matters. They said that Timmy (chief operating officer of institutional equities at Cantor) absolutely adored her and begged her to come to work for him at Cantor.

They said how considerate Nancy is, how she came to see her ex-boss at Tzell after he had a brain tumor operation at the end of August.

Mindy