“Bunny, I wish you were my godmother.”

I’ll never forget the look on Bunny’s face. We were standing at the bottom of the stairs in my parents’ home. It must have been around Christmas and I was home from college. Indiana to Connecticut didn’t happen too often; it was good to be around family.

My Mom’s younger sister’s face brightened into a beautiful smile. She told me she’d have been glad to be my godmother. (For some reason, my parents chose non-relatives for me; all three of my brothers had aunt and uncles for their godparents.)

Harry, my parents’ firstborn, remembers Bunny with a smile on his face:

This is a bit irreverent, but Bunny was the one who told me the joke about the naive nun who spent a rare day in town. After the cab returned her to the convent, she told the other nuns about her exciting day.

“And sisters, the best thing of all was, the cab driver was such a good Catholic!”

“How do you know, sister?”

“Well he was such a nice man I gave him a whole quarter for a tip, and he said ‘Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!”

I loved Bunny’s sense of humor, and the way she treated us as equals, never talking down to us.

Cecelia Frances Cassidy was born on January 17, 1933 in New Haven, Connecticut. A Tuesday. Since we always called her Bunny, it only recently occured to me that she was named for her parents, Ceil and Frank.

A life-threatening case of croup at age two brought the toddler to the hospital. As they approached the medical center, a rabbit hopped across the street and onto the hospital’s lawn. Mom had already said her baby sister crinkled her nose like a bunny when laughing. That clinched it; Bunny’s nickname was born. (My youngest brother, Bill, remembers nephew Andy on the phone with Bunny once, thrilled to have a chat with the Easter Bunny!)

The joke Bunny shared with Harry is a reminder that at age 20, she entered the convent of the Grey Nuns of Montreal.

Always dedicated to her faith, Bunny stayed in the convent for two years.

This photo is from February 5, 1954. That’s Bunny, fourth from the left:

And here’s the back of the photo with lots of details. “Some man got in the way.” Grandma’s notes still make me laugh.

After Bunny moved home, Grandma teamed up her friend Margaret O’Brien. They played matchmaker.

Successfully:

Bunny and Bill settled in North Haven and had two daughters – Suzanne and Mary Beth – in the coming years. (I admit to being very jealous of my cousins, as their mother worked at the local McDonald’s while they were at school. Free fries!)

Bunny and Mom both loved to read and often swapped books. The last time we were all together, I remember the sight of Bunny making a beeline over to her sister, sitting close, holding hands, and talking gently. “Thick as thieves, those two,” I thought. Mom passed away a few months later.

And now Bunny is gone, too. No more phone calls, no more birthday cards, no more trading books and recommending shows like BBC’s Father Brown. We’ll miss her Christmas celebrations and her loving hugs.

Here are Dave’s thoughts:

Mom‘s clearest inheritance from Grandma, who played piano by ear and wrote poetry, was her artistic talent. Bunny’s was personality and presence. Dad used to refer to Grandma as a “spark plug,” a perpetual-motion machine in a 4’11” frame. Bunny, while a bit taller, had her mother’s always-on energy level as well as her desire to connect, and she kept these through her latest years. 

When Marie-Susanne and I were at Mom and Dad’s empty house taking inventory of the belongings they left behind, we had Bunny and Suzanne over for dinner. This was well into the COVID pandemic, and Bunny was bursting with the desire to talk; her energy level was not that of a typical octogenarian! We visited her at her rehab facility a year later during Dad’s Celebration of Life, and her wattage had not diminished one bit. It was no surprise to learn from her daughters that Bunny had a “posse” of friends on her floor.

Bunny loved to travel. After Bill retired, they went to Ireland to seek out her ancestral home in Northern Ireland.

She’d often reminisce about the friendliness of the Irish people.

The jewel in her crown? Oh, that would have to be Cady, her granddaughter.

Bunny wanted a grandchild so badly. Mom would tell me she would say, “I only want one. Is that too much to ask?” I remember all her loving mentions of Cady in cards and letters. She readily confessed to spoiling “the boss.”

We started this story with a joke. Let’s end it with an Irish blessing for all:

May your neighbors respect you,
Troubles neglect you,
The angels protect you,
And Heaven accept you.

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