Page created by: LINDA DUDIK

Dorothy Anne Dudik was my Big Sister. In her childhood, our parents nicknamed her “Cookie.” Generally, it was a name used only by the family. When she was 21 years old, Cookie acquired another title, that of “wife” when she married John Marote in 1959, becoming Dorothy Anne Marote. He lovingly and patiently cared for my sister as her Parkinson’s progressed. John developed a method to safely get her up and down the front porch steps, he hired a professional handyman who installed grab bars in the bathrooms for her to hold onto, and he created an “only John could understand it” computer-generated chart for her medications. These are just some examples of his caregiving, which ended only with his death in 2017. Cookie thus held the title of “wife” for 58 years.
Early in her marriage, my sister also became a mother, with David born in 1963 and Kathryn in 1966. Her title of “mother” was probably the one that gave her the most joy. Cookie was gifted with artistic skills that surfaced at various times in her life. She could draw, paint, and create small, stained-glass figures. Cookie also baked and decorated children’s birthday cakes. She worked her artistic magic with the cakes not merely for David and Kathryn, but for their friends, too. Some of her art I will always remember were framed representations she drew of the Fairy Godmothers from Walt Disney’s 1959 movie, Sleeping Beauty. The care my sister took in drawing and then painting Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather perhaps stays with me to this day because I saw them as reflections of her love for the son she still had not met. She framed the paintings in the summer of 1963, shortly before David was born. The Three Fairies were present when first David and then Kathryn came home from the hospital. For years, until her children were older, she was a stay-at-home mother, cooking and baking for her family. Through camping trips, Cookie and John introduced their children to the wonders of California’s majestic sequoia redwoods. David and Kathryn’s lifelong love of nature and the outdoors took root in those vacations under the stars. A year ago, Cookie’s son and daughter took her back to the sequoias one last time. Logistically, because of Parkinson’s, the trip was not an easy one, but it was memorable. Cookie held the title of David’s “mother” for almost 59 years and 56 years for Kathryn. Because of her children, she eventually assumed the title of “mother-in-law” and “grandmother.”
In the context of the aforementioned titles that she assumed throughout her life, the longest held one was that of my “Big Sister.” She held that title longer than “daughter,” longer than “wife,” and longer than “mother.” With ten years between us, she took care of me when I was little. Our two older siblings were married by 1953 when my father decided to move from Pennsylvania to California. We left behind not only a sister and brother, but also an extended family of aunts, uncles, and cousins. It was just the four of us once we arrived in California. I was five, Cookie fifteen. She watched over me more, I am sure, than she wanted to. Like all little children, I could be a pest at times. In 1953, we lived in a new tract home in Fontana, with groves of orange trees behind the houses. Cookie sometimes took me out to the groves, left me in a clearing, and then ran to hide behind the trees. I, of course, cried, not knowing she was still right there, watching over me. When we were both older and could laugh about it, Cookie recounted, many times, this “game,” as only a Big Sister could call it.
The ten years between us meant less and less as the years went by. After Cookie graduated from high school, she got a job at the Los Angeles County Courthouse. More than once, she took this kid sister to work with her, which made me feel so grown up. Cookie gave me my first birthday party in those same years, and after she met John, I acted as their “chaperone” when we watched TV at John’s rented bungalow. In time, I graduated from high school, went on to college, married, and had two children. Cookie was always there when I needed her.
Acts of kindness marked Dorothy Anne Dudik Marote’s time on this earth, emanating from her giving nature. Cookie would probably identify her most significant, adult roles as those of a wife and mother. I would not disagree. Still, for 74 years she was, and always will be, my Big Sister.