Mom it has been 2 years since you left us I miss talking with you. I know we will see each other again. Love Chris

My beautiful amazing mother, Mary Louise Navarro Welch left this world Nov 30, 2021. My mom was something special she was tough, beautiful determined and brilliant. She was born Nov. 12, 1933, in San Antonio, Texas. Life dealt her a tough hand early she was orphaned at age 5, along with her sister Dorothy 7 when their mother died. She married young, and at 16 had my brother Rick, then Mark, Herbert and at 22 she had me. I was told she cried when they told her it was another boy. Her fourth in a row. She finally got that elusive girl my sister Eve four years later. My mother was the backbone of our family many times when my father who was a professional soldier a veteran of WWII, Korea and Vietnam was gone six months or more on deployments, and it was up to her to keep everything together. She basically raised us alone. The thing I most admire about my mom is her dedication to bettering herself. While rearing five children, she began taking college classes part time and completed her bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees in English literature. She went on to become a college Professor of English Literature emeritus and Director of Honors at Sinclair College in Dayton, Ohio where she taught until she was 68. She loved teaching and ruled the roost in the English department at Sinclair.
Growing up in a military family you are always moved to new bases every 2- 3 years my mom would start a new household and then find a new place to keep taking college classes. I was still in Highschool when she got her bachelor’s degree. I was 16 when we were stationed in Madrid Spain, I started rodeo in the military rodeo circuit. She wasn’t crazy about me riding bulls and my little sister barrel racing but she became the treasure of the rodeo club.
My mom loved opera and to travel. On her summers off she was a volunteer teaching abroad and I remember the time my mom in her sixties was teaching in Rome and robbed of everything and had a tough time getting home. I would sure like to run into that SOB sometime. My mom she just kept traveling and visited every continent, the last was Antarctica and the Galapagos Islands she made it there in her seventies. 
When I look back over my mom’s life and I see the difficult road she had to travel and how hard she worked to get her education while raising 5 kids. My mom was a force something special I got my spirit toughness and determination from her. She is the reason I am the man I am today. I love you and I am so proud that you were my mom.

I have so enjoyed talking with Mary these last few years at Woman’s Literary Club. She has been a lovely addition to our programs, and I have appreciated her find mind and interesting conversation. I feel priviledged to have known her, if only for a few years.