A memorial service for Carole was held in Berkeley, California, on November 2, 2014. At this service, eulogies were given by Carole's family and friends. Several of these are reprinted below.
Eulogy of Abigail Malkin, granddaughter
I have never met anyone like my Grandmother.
In everything she did, Grandma gave us so much love. After she died, Ilana and I had very different reactions. I had trouble really believing or processing what had happened, and it didn’t feel real to me. I was silent and removed. Ilana was the complete opposite. She was broken to pieces and inconsolable. What remains very clear in my memory was when she said to me “Don’t you understand? The one person who loved us most in the world is gone.”
I don’t think I ever fully appreciated her and everything she did for me. It wasn’t even the direct things she did for me, but the love she gave me when I didn’t even know it. She was ALWAYS thinking of me, always supporting me, always loving me.
Something that set Grandma apart from the rest was her selflessness. Her only concern was you. She devoted her whole self to you. I on the other hand was always selfish. She would ask me if I wanted to play cribbage with her just in an effort to spend time with me. I would say I didn’t feel like it. She would ask me if I wanted to play scrabble, boggle, pretty much anything and I would respond by saying “I hate games.” This obviously doesn’t shed the best light on me, but I wanted to share it because I think it emphasizes just how selfless she was. Most people, including me, feel guilty about not taking those moments, and for taking our time together for granted, but something she would always tell me was to never EVER feel guilty about our relationship. This is something she told me over and over again. She said that many times when someone dies, a person copes by finding things they did wrong and punishing themselves by being feeling guilty about it. It really says something about her that one of her main concerns when she knew she didn’t have much time was making sure that we “never felt that we did anything to wrong her in any way.” She loved us so much that she found the most comfort in knowing that we were happy.
She was never one to judge or criticize. She was always there to advise me and guide me, but she never tried to change me. She told me, “Whatever you do, it is of course, your decision and I support you.” And she truly meant it.
Something else she once said to me was “All that is predictable is unpredictability. It's certainly helpful to have a bit of insight into ourselves in this world.” And she gave me that insight. Whenever I told her stories of my week, she’d always find a way to use them in teaching me something about myself or other people.
I think the main lesson she tried to teach me was to love myself and do whatever I need to do to make myself happy. But what I hope to do instead is to find a way to return the patience, understanding, and devotion she gave me.
Before writing this, I looked back on all our emails and letters. Something that kept popping up was her saying how lucky she was to have us, how thoughtful we were, or how fortunate she was to be our grandmother. But the truth is, we were the lucky ones. My sister and I, Grandpa, all of you. We were all the lucky ones.
Eulogy of Ilana Malkin, granddaughter
I have not known my grandmother for as long as many of you gathered here. I only touched the back end of her life, knew her when she was older, wiser, more tried by life. I did not help her as she raised her children, did not celebrate with her when she published her first book, did not hold her hand when she was first diagnosed with cancer. I wonder about the many moments I missed, a whole life I know nothing about.
There is so much to say about my grandma. There are so many stories I could tell, happy and sad, advice that she gave me—things that I haven’t yet figured out how to express. I wonder how someone so kind could have experienced so much tragedy. I cannot imagine the weight of her losses.
In losing her, I feel farther away from my father. She told me she saw Daniel in me; I wish I told her that she too was my glimpse of Daniel. There are many things I wish I said.
When I think of her, my last trip to Colorado comes to mind, two weeks before her death.
She told me, “I’ll remember you forever.”
I told her, “I will too.”
Eulogy of Jesse Malkin, son
I can’t remember the first time my mom and I played Scrabble. It must have been at least 30 years ago. In those early days, she wasn’t very good. She tended to favor erudite words, like “eschew,” when a Scrabble-friendly word like “xi” (spelled X-I) put in the right place could score far more points.
In those days we played on a basic board. As time went on, some of the tiles became so worn that we could no longer tell what letters they were. About 10 years ago, Mickey and I bought my parents a deluxe set that swivels around in a circle -- like a Chinese restaurant turntable.
Often, my dad and Mickey would join us. If not, my mom and I played one on one.
She loved to play other games, too, like Balderdash, Charades, and Cribbage.
But those games came and went. Scrabble was our favorite, her favorite. When we visited Berkeley at Christmas, my mom and I always made time to play at least a couple times. It was our tradition.
My parents played on their own, too. They had a traveler’s set that they used to take with them on the airplane or at the doctor’s office. I would sometimes receive emails informing me of a particularly impressive score. Here’s an email from my dad last October: “I am to report to you that your mother got a 112-point score on one play today. A Malkin record?”
Yes, it probably is, dad.
Here’s something you might not know: Underlying my mom’s wonderfully gentle exterior was the heart of a fierce competitor. She acquired a Scrabble dictionary (another gift from Mickey and me) and began using high-scoring words like “eh” (an utterance), “xu” (a Vietnamese coin), and “qaid” (I have no idea what it means but it’s in the Scrabble dictionary). She used raunchy curse words, which amused my kids greatly.
She put the prefix “re” before pretty much any verb, not only legitimate words like “reheat” and “restart” but “redie” (“to die again”) and “rereheat” (to reheat something twice). The arguments that ensued over Carole-isms like “rereheat” were as much fun as playing the game itself.
Mom passed on the Scrabble tradition to JD. At first, she insisted on playing without keeping score because she didn’t want him to feel intimidated. Before long, he was almost as good as the adults. I joked, “JD, I don’t want you to embarrass your grandma; maybe we should play without keeping score.”
Even as she grew sicker and her days were numbered, Mom was always up for Scrabble, which she played with great relish from her kitchen table. We played our last game on August 23. Here’s a photo. She was very weak by then.
To my shock, she won.
Mom, I want a rematch.