She came to this country from Scotland to join with her already-arrived parents during Germany's torpedo war against merchant shipping, traveling alone on a passenger ship in the North Atlantic. She was 14. She became the first woman in her family to graduate from college; then from graduate school.
As a teacher, she taught mainstream students and then, up until her 85th year, those judged "at risk" who would come to her classroom wearing court-mandated electronic ankle bracelets.
She made me go to church every Sunday and saw to it I became an acolyte who knew what he was doing. When I was five, she made sure I learned how to swim at the local Y; then made sure, summer after summer, that we went down to the sea.
She taught me how to fight for one's students and against impassive and dull-witted bureaucracies, as I watched her do when she was involved in local politics. She is 4 feet, 11 inches of iron. To this day, whenever I find myself encountering some diocesan martinet I think, "Do you really want to mess with me? I'm Mary Clements' son."