CORNWALL — Sarah Margaret Paul, July 2, 1936 – October 3, 2026.
As you read this obituary, please do so in the lovely British accent our mother, Sarah Paul retained all her life. But don’t be fooled by this posh exterior: mom preferred simple LL Bean shirts and pants, chain-sawed her own trees, and could change a back bicycle tire. She grew up under the class and gender strictures of mid-twentieth century England, warned away from anything remotely risky or “unladylike” by her mother, which led her to believe all her life that she lacked courage.
But at 21 she came to this country with just one friend. She once chased an intruder from our house, denting her clogs as she kicked him. In her 50s she did a solo skydive, which she claims was the second-best thing she ever did after raising her three children, though we suspect skydiving was first-best. In later life her life alert triggered accidentally and the local fire department arrived to see mom on a ladder pulling down ivy like it was a CrossFit event. They asked her where the frail lady who had fallen might be.
Other courageous things: She went to Trinity college at 40 years old and graduated summa cum laude. She then became a social worker after a long career of housewifery and taking care of us three kids, which no doubt prepared her. She divorced our father (a very good man, but not a love match) at a time when divorce was frowned upon, and fell in love with someone much younger, much to the shock of some in our small, beloved town of Cornwall, Connecticut. She and The Love of Her Life travelled all over the world; when they split after eighteen years, she was heartbroken. But she built a new life on the west coast and found a passion in bicycling at 62 years old. She cycled with the local bike group until almost 80.
During her long life, Mom lived in Liverpool, Paris, NYC, and Ashland, Oregon but the hometown she most loved was Cornwall, Connecticut where she spent almost thirty years.
During that time, Mom wanted her kids to have a bigger childhood than she had, believing it would make us well-rounded adults. Thus she endured cold mornings at Mohawk mountain, strapping us into the clunky ski gear of the time even though she didn’t ski; sent us to Sunday School at the Congregational church even though she was never quite sold on religion; told us we had to play an instrument for a year at least, though she knew nothing of music. She cheered whichever of her three kids might be on the playing field at Cornwall Consolidated school and ferried us to swim meets every summer at Cream Hill Lake and beyond, though she famously swam only with her head above water in order not to ruin her hair. And she was right, of course: it forged us into uncomplaining and reasonably capable adults comfortable in many different environments.
Mom was proud to be an American citizen and was adamant about voting: “people died for the vote,” she told us kids, and if we didn’t cast our ballot we weren’t invited to Thanksgiving (her one regret may be that she did not hang on long enough to vote in the upcoming midterms.) She was always aghast at the casual, constant way Americans said “I love you,” though by the end she began to say it regularly. Mom believed strongly in civic duty and as early as the 1970s she was recycling. She volunteered all her life: you may have been the Cornwall kid slouched on a bad-tempered pony while mom coaxed you from the middle of the ring in Pony Club. For many years she gave her time to the Cornwall Child Care Center; later she registered voters and fought for affordable health care. She held signs at progressive protests until Parkinson’s and old age would not let her leave the house. She loved to garden, insisting weeding was good therapy.
Mom had the rare ability to be awed by small things like a changing sky or a flower. She roamed her neighborhood at night when she couldn’t sleep hoping to see a bear and once got up at 3 am to watch Haley’s comet. She read constantly; first books in french and other highfalutin novels, later she developed an appreciation for mysteries. She loved LLBean ultrasoft flannel sheets (so much that she is buried in her favorite set.) She wasn’t afraid to change her mind, pivoting from Republican to Democrat. As a mother, she restricted sugary treats and television, much to our dismay. One fateful day she marched into our brother’s bedroom where he sat catatonic in front of the “boob tube” and heaved it out the second-floor window. This enshrined her in the parenting canon and certainly endures as Cornwall lore among a certain generation of then-kids. “I didn’t even mind cleaning up the garden in the morning” she said). Yet later in life she faithfully watched anything Rachel Maddow and David Attenborough while savoring vanilla ice cream. She loved understated British humor, which is why she may not like this obit, and why she and her sister Georgie would routinely laugh so hard they had tears rolling down their cheeks. Despite all this, mom still thought she was a forgettable type. She will be pleased to know that one of her caregivers told us that because of Mom she now votes, watches PBS, and uses a water pic.
Mom died on October 3, 2026 at 90 with her three kids and her beloved brother-in-law around her, dreaming, we hope, of one more bicycling trip along Town Street, gazing at the curve ahead, the Scoville corn, and the bursting color of autumn leaves ahead of her.
