A Multi-talented Angel by Rosanne Catalano, Aka R.C.Kayla

She found peace and spiritual release in penning her emotions on paper in poetic form. Writing poetry was among one of Barbara's many favorite pastimes. She also loved playing the guitar, tap dancing and socializing with her multitude of friends...

My friend Barbara Ann Hoover was born to an American German jewelry salesman father and Indian American waitress mother in Flushing, Queens. She grew up attending church regularly with her father; where she sang in the choir. With her mother alongside her, she attended tap dancing classes every Saturday morning. She learned to play the guitar later on in life. And she would often sing and strum a manual guitar at the office Christmas parties to the delight of her co-workers, who would join her in a sing-along. And yes, it was her very own guitar and Barbara was real proud of the fact that she bought it with her own hard-earned money; as she should be. Just like when she was proud that she had finally learned to drive at 19, then bought her own car at 22; it was a Nissan. It went to her brother after she was killed. As did her precious cat. Everyone always had a great time in Barbara's company... she was the sunshine we all craved in a dark world. Barbara was an honest, loyal and loving friend who had patience and tolerance with everyone she came into contact with. She should have been a teacher instead of a secretary.

As a little girl Barbara wore pigtails. She told me it was to cover her brown curly hair because long and straight hair was the "style" of the day. Although she smiled and laughed a lot, sadly, she was depressed about being a little on the heavy-side. And she had a very gloomy outlook about her life and herself; almost as if she had had a premonition that she would die young? We will never know if this is so. But she had called every single one of her close friends a week before her fatal accident. She had told me, and them, the same exact thing: "We definitely must get together when I come back from The Hamptons! And one day I'd like for you to spend a weekend here with me and my cousin." Barbara had planned to go back home to Flushing, Queens, to see her family and friends. And was looking forward to once again working as a secretary at Sony Corporation®...

She got the secretarial job at Sony® right after graduating high school in 1974. Switching careers from secretary of Sony's electronic data processing department, she became a computer programmer after a year of training on-the-job. However, after a couple of months of programming computers she decided it wasn't what she wanted to do. So, as much as she hated to do so, she resigned from Sony® and got a job elsewhere as a human resources counselor. Although she enjoyed being a personnel counselor, eventually she realized she enjoyed being a secretary more and decided she wanted her old job at Sony® back. She was waiting to hear back from them about re-hiring her, when her life was cut short at twenty-four years of age by a drunk driver...

It was early Sunday in June of the year nineteen-eighty-one when she was struck by a car driven by a drunk driver in The Hamptons, Long Island New York. She was on a second date with a guy she liked a lot. She had begun dating this guy shortly after a two year serious relationship fizzled. A relationship Barbara had thought would lead to marriage; he up and married another woman instead, which devastated her.

She and one of her cousins then rented a summer home in the ritzy, quaint town of The Hamptons in Long Island, New York, where lots of celebrity-sightings and artists could be found. Barbara and her cousin would spend most weekends, including three-day-holiday-weekends, at their rented summer house. They would drive out to Long Island from Queens after work on Fridays.

Her death was due to fatal internal injuries suffered when she was hit by a car, driven by a man who had been drinking a lot. He obviously had not seen her standing by the driver's door of her date's car. If she had lived, complete paralysis is what she would have had to confront. Every bone in her body was broken when the car hit her; throwing her into a tree nearby. Although the ambulances and EMS arrived quickly, she was semi-conscious and still breathing, though in shock, when they began CPR...she died later at Riverhead Hospital on Long Island; far from her parent's house in Flushing, Queens.

The sunshine went out of the lives of those who knew and loved her...

Although he also had a son, her father never got over losing his daughter and died ten years after Barbara of a heart attack. Some could say that he also died of a broken heart; for he and Barbara were extremely close. So close, in fact, that her father took one last photo of his beloved daughter while she lay in her final resting place. Some would say that was a morbid thing to do but I understood it nonetheless.

On the other hand, Barbara and her mother had been on-the-outs and weren't speaking to one another at the time of her passing. With tears streaming down her face, Barbara's mother told me at the wake & funeral that she felt so guilty about her and Barbara having fought a lot and not getting along. The reason was because her mother was constantly trying to get Barbara to lose weight. Barbara would get mad and storm out of the house.

Although she was just another drunk-driving statistic in the newspapers that day, Barbara was a loving, breathing human being who had dreams of getting married and having children one day... the guy she was with on the day of the accident was someone she felt that maybe there could be a future with him. But it wasn't meant to be. Maybe God needed more angelic music, poetry and tap dancers in paradise instead. That's what I would like to think is the reason our heavenly Father took her so young...

She penned the below poem shortly after that two-year-serious relationship ended in disaster:

How did this happen to me?
How does life flip over?
So quickly --
One day here,
One day not;
A love...
A life...
What does it all mean?
How many senseless hours
must be spent --
Isn't it enough to be cursed
With the feeling of caring?
Must I live for it?
Must I die for it?

copyright (c.) by Barbara Ann Hoover; April 2, 1980.

When I met Barbara there was an instant connection of friendship between us. It was the day of my job interview with Sony Corporation® where I ended up working as her assistant for two years (1979 to 1981). I was bored to tears during the interview with my soon-to-be-boss. The reason was that he was explaining in detail about electronic data processing and computers, and I had no interest in technology at that point in time. I walked out of his office thinking I wasn't sure I even wanted to work for a boring boss such as he!

Barbara must have seen my look of boredom, put her arm on my shoulder and said to me, "he does that with everyone during the interview but he's a really terrific guy!" She then walked me out to the front of the building and said before I left for home, "I hope you will take this job in spite of Lance, I need an assistant badly!"

Lo and behold when I got home, the phone was ringing. It was Lance, my soon-to-be-boss. He told me he wanted me to work for him if I still wanted the job! Of course I told him "yes, I'd love to work for you!" Hey, even though he was a boring man, I needed that job at Sony® so I overlooked this aspect of his personality. And I'm glad I did, he ended up being one of the best and nicest bosses I have ever worked for!!!

Barbara later told me she was so happy I took the job as her assistant because she really liked me and knew we would get along as co-workers. She was 100% right; we ended up becoming great friends at work and socially. I also became friends with Barbara's friends. Except for one woman named Violet, who was jealous of me and of my close friendship with Barbara.

Violet walked up to me on my first day at Sony®, while I was busily typing at my desk, and says, "you can't stay here. There's only room for one big-chested woman in this office!" I was flabbergasted! I couldn't believe this woman had the nerve to say that to me; no one had ever said such a thing to me before! I looked over at Barbara, and she firmly but kindly put Violet instantly in her place by telling her, "I hired Rosanne and want her to stay. What you want is of no concern to this department. So please go back to your's." Once Violet slinked back to her own department, Barbara and I burst out laughing.

In that instant we knew our working relationship was going to work out. It did. We worked great together as a "team" for the entire two years I worked there. I helped with her workload as her assistant and she helped me by patiently teaching me the ropes about electronic data processing and all that was involved with my job at Sony®. While training me, Barbara had more patience with the fact that I processed information slowly than any other person ever had. I worked over twenty years as a secretary -- before going full-time 5 years ago with my publishing & writing -- and was trained on-the-job by many professionals before Barbara but none were as great or as patient as she.

Sometimes, after work, me, Barbara and a couple of her other friends would go to a restaurant / nightclub where we could eat supper and then dance the night away. Most of these restaurant / nightclubs were in New York City; sometimes in Queens. We had wonderful times; dancing, laughing and eating out! And no, that woman Violet was never invited to any after-work social gatherings. Thank God. I had never disliked a person upon first meeting them as much as I disliked Violet. Though, Violet did eat lunch with us on occasion because, in Barbara's kind hearted way, she felt sorry for her. I, on the other hand, never did. I thought Violet was a mean-spirited person after that ridiculous remark on my first day at Sony®.

It was Barbara's best friend who called me that awful Sunday morning...

Carmen started the phone conversation by saying, "Barbara passed away this morning..." and I seriously thought she was joking with me! Unfortunately she wasn't...

Also unfortunately, Carmen and I haven't kept in touch since 2003; when my husband and I moved into our first home and she moved into a smaller apartment. But we had remained friends for twenty-two years after Barbara died. It still saddens me that Carmen and I have not kept in touch but I do realize our lives changed and that we no longer had anything in common to talk about.

I forgot to mention that Carmen and Barbara were best friends from childhood. They grew up together; living right next door to one another. And were like sisters, because neither one had a sister. Carmen is an only child and Barbara had just a brother. So it pleased Barbara that her best friend and sister, and I, also got along fabulously.

On the ten-year-anniversary of our friend Barbara Ann Hoover's death (1991), Carmen and I went to her gravesite and planted a tree. We actually had a shovel and dug a little hole by her tombstone. After the tree was in the ground, I left a copy of the poem I had written about Barbara ten years before, titled "In Loving Memory"... I left my poem so that her family could read it. And know that their child and sister was very much loved by all.

I still cry sometimes when I think about the opportunities in life my friend Barbara never got a chance to enjoy... marriage, children and a job she truly loved as much as I now love mine. And if it hadn't been for the poem I penned about her passing away being published in print and online, I wouldn't be where I am today. The poem "In Loving Memory" was my way of dealing with the grief of losing a dear, wonderful and kind friend. Two weeks after her fatal accident, my now-ex-husband and I got engaged. But Barbara's death took all the joy out of finally marrying the man I had been living with for three years. Yes Barbara knew him. And had told me if I had not met my now-ex, she would have matched me up with her brother. That was her, a matchmaker :) Oh, did I forget to tell you that? Sorry. Barbara, unfortunately, wasn't too good at matchmaking lol, but I say this lovingly...every single couple she matched up got divorced. These memories of Barbara and the good times we all had will always be dear to my heart.

For Barbara was truly an angel here on earth and a multi-talented one at that. And her best friend & sister, Carmen, was a good friend of mine for twenty-two years.

Some people you don't have to know for years and years to know they are special. Barbara was a special person to all who knew her; a true angel here on earth and maybe a divine angel in disguise? Could very well be! All I know is that Barbara Ann Hoover lives on in everyone's heart forever more. And our heavenly Father has gained a beautiful and multi-talented soul...

Copyright © 2007 Rosanne Catalano.