Cheryl June Colehour
(1966 - 2011)

"This is the memorial I set up for Cheryl Colehour. To sign the guest book, click on the "Sign Guest Book" button below. "

"I never knew Cheryl, however Tom and I are friends from long ago. It is easy to see the beauty of a mother, wife and friend when learning about her.
Peace to All."

"My deepest sympathy goes out to the entire family. Cheryl was the sweetest, kindest person and I enjoyed my time working with her. She is missed dearly!"

"My most vivid memory of Cheryl is of her smiling, enjoying the children, and enjoying the moment. The most recent is of her at Jill's wedding with her beautiful dress, amazing haircut, and sweet countenance. She is an amazing spirit that is in everything we see and touch. Her love for others is the characteristic I like to remember most. The other side is blessed to have her. We will love and miss her until we are all together again!"

"Cheryl was such a wonderful spirit. I loved stopping by her desk for a quick chat. There was always something funny to say/share. I will miss her and have missed her since she left.
Thank you Cheryl for being a light in my life."

"I had to pleasure of seeing Cheryl and her beautiful family every Friday night at the Luna Park Cafe. She was an interesting woman, she made an impression and opened my mind even in the briefest of conversations. Unbeknownst, she held a mirror in front of me, reminding me to be a good person and strive to live close to my values, as she did hers. She was humble and down to earth. I will miss our conversations, and hold her memory dearly. "

"I first met Cheryl while serving on the WSUU RE Council, creating rich experiences for the children of our congregation. When Cheryl was diagnosed with breast cancer, it was obvious that she, our mutual friend Wendy, and I, would all bond over that shared experienced. We laughed, told each other the good and the bad, and cared deeply. Walking the catwalk at the NW Hope and Healing fashion show is my favorite memory with Cheryl - she looked so beautiful, strong, and brave, and I was inspired.

It took me a while to fill anything out here, because I feel her loss, and struggle to make sense of it.

My heart goes out to Tom, Clara, and August, hoping that they find comfort in the knowledge of how deeply Cheryl loved them.

I will honor Cheryl next year by walking the Breast Cancer 3-Day. I had hoped that one day we could do it together, but I will walk - and fundraise - to honor her, and to find a cure so that our daughters need never walk."

"I never had the privilege of meeting Cheryl, but I have known Tom since elementary school. My heart is broken for this family and I hope they all find peace very soon."

"I met Cheryl through the Fauntleroy Children's Center when our girls were very young. Later we sat in the back at church and let the kids roll around on the floor during service. When I was diagnosed I remember being at church and talking to Cheryl at length about her fears around cancer and how careful she was about screening...then two weeks later she got the bad news too. Her cancer never gave her a break. I think she may have had some down time last summer during the trip to Michigan. I know that was a much needed break...and she loved seeing her family.
I will miss seeing Cheryl on Sunday mornings...hanging in the back row. And I am proud to say that we walked the catwalk together. So out of the box for Cheryl...but she did it and she was beautiful!
"

"I met Cheryl through our cancer support group at Gilda's Club. I think we were all stunned by this news, because she always seemed to be doing so well, and was so positive and supportive of the rest of us. She was the one person in "group" that I didn't feel was judging me. I looked forward to seeing her, and I miss her already. I hadn't been to group in a while, but the last time I saw her, was right before my mastectomy. She knew how scared I was and gave me a hug before we all left. Had I known that was the last time I would see her I would have hugged harder. My heart goes out to Tom, Clara and August. It's so unfair."

"I'll never forget the day I went to pick up my son at Fauntleroy Children's Center and Clara told me that her mom had breast cancer. I didn't know Cheryl, but Clara wanted us to connect because I have breast cancer too. Even when she was feeling ill, Cheryl was such a radiant person. She was so kind and loving, yet could laugh at twisted cancer humor. I wish I'd known her longer, and I know I'll never forget her. My heart is with Tom, Clara and August."

"I became friends with Cheryl when we were teenagers, meeting through our church. Her maturity always made her seem much older than she actually was. I remember her intuitive, laser-sharp perspective when I would come to her with a struggle, a challenge or was just trying on some new ideas for size. She had an incredible way of gently separating my emotional and intellectual wheat from the chaff.

As people tend to do, we ended up drifting apart during college. Several years later, at a new job, I met this incredible person named Tom who was to become one of my best friends. I was happily surprised to find out that his girlfriend in Seattle was my old friend Cheryl! I was blessed to be friends with both, celebrating their marriage and loving the family that they made together. When I was up visiting, I always felt like I was home. I loved being with Cheryl and Tom. It always felt like a two-for-one deal having both as my dear friends.

Every time I feel this terrible sadness about our loss of Cheryl, I try to balance it with a happy memory. I keep going back to some of the teenage late-night talks we had. I remember talking about everything and nothing at the same time. I remember how exciting it was when our conversations would challenge me look for and find answers beyond my comfort zone.

Cheryl: You have been a vibrant part of what is Good and Right in this world. You have made a difference in many lives, including my own. Thank you for being part of my life. Thank you for sharing your amazing and too-short life with me."

"I've had a hard time finding words to express the sadness we are feeling for our neighbors' loss. While I only knew Cheryl for a short while, I was continually amazed by her strength, bravery, and positive outlook as she faced this devastating illness. She was inspiring to me and I will never forget her. Tom, Clara, and August, please know we are beside you, literally and figuratively, as friends and neighbors."

"Cheryl was my best friend in Jr High, and we remained close throughout our teen years. It was with much joy that I reconnected with her a few years ago, and I am thankful we had a day together this summer.

As teens, in some ways we were polar opposites -- I was intense and self-destructive, and she was poised and controlled. I was artsy punk rock, she was much more conservative in dress (and always had immaculate long nails!). But we shared much more than was obvious from our surfaces. I have many fond memories of talking policy and religion, laughing and creating. We both loved learning about things, and looking at the dynamics of situations. I wasn't her only close friend, but for several years, she was mine.

Cheryl changed my life. As a teen, she grounded me during many of my darkest moments -- at times protecting me and always challenging me to get my act together by her example. I always knew she loved me unconditionally, and that she understood me. Not my behavior, but me. She understood where I was coming from. She was one of those dear friends who loved me sober, and whose examples helped me realize that my life would be better without intoxicants. Cheryl introduced me to UUism, and we were in leadership together. She was such a strong leader by example and intentionality. Over the years, we went camping, worshiped and protested, and commiserated about various boyfriends. We had many laughs and tears together, and so much of my life today includes memories of her and things I learned with her and from her.

I have met few people in my life with the sheer determination and deep kindness of Cheryl, and with her wit and sense of balance. I know she dearly loved her husband and her kids, and I loved hearing about them when we talked. I hope she knew how much I admired, respected, and loved her. While we weren't close over the last 20 years, I feel her absence keenly. I know she will be missed by so many, and we are so fortunate to have known her. "

"I am a friend of Cheryl’s from when we worked together at KCTS about 20 years ago. I haven’t seen her so much in the last few years - which I regret deeply. Cheryl was a wonderful and rare person - others who’ve posted got it right - wildly smart with razor-sharp insight, but always gentle, kind, and also very funny! I will miss her hugely! I know she loved being a mother and thrived in the role. I am so glad that Clara and August and Tom were the recipients of the incredible love she had for them, and I hope it will sustain them. My thoughts are with them and with Cheryl."

"I know the Humphrey family from FCC. I was a staff member there and had Clara in my class, after meeting our daughters became fast friends. Cheryl was a dedicated mother and only wanted the very best for her children andfor them to be happy. We moved out of town and even after her treatments she would pack up the kids and venture out into the country for play dates. I was in awe at her strength and ability to just throw her head back and laugh even during times of adversity. Cheryl was a remarkable woman and we will truly miss her."

"Cheryl was my best friend from Kindergarten through 12th grade. We remained in contact during college but we drifted into separate lives with sparse contact through the years. We reconnected through Facebook but regretfully I did not see her before she passed. Cheryl’s family was central to my formative years. Her mom, Vernal, was a co-leader of the CampFire group along with my mother. Cheryl and I spent innumerable overnights at each other’s houses. Summer camps, weekends, camping trips.... Some of my best memories were with Cheryl and the Colehours.

Vignettes of a lifetime of memories:
* Exploring and playing in the woods of Somerset (before there were houses)
* Getting lost on the bus and ending up in Burien
* Ski weekends at the Moutaineers cabin at I Snoqualmie Pass - the Colehours would graciously invite me to join them.
* Cheryl’s incredible speed reading ability - finishing 3 books to my 1.
* 3rd grade - putting worms in Ms Snyder’s desk (she was mean to us)
* And in 4th grade Mr Laycock teasing us about it by drawing pictures of worms on hand-outs.
* In 4th grade she brought us into the world of witches. We practices spells and eventually put a hex on a classmate.
* Campfire group - numerous camping trips, activities summer camps...
* Multi-family camping trips - especially the canoeing trip on Lake Kachees
* Candystriping at Group Health Hospital
* Concerts: Rush, The Go-Gos and Prince
* Midnight Rocky Horror Picture Show at the Neptune
* Cheryl’s first video production at Evergreen
* Her beautiful and poignant wedding just after her mom’s passing


Cheryl - you will be missed. But you live on with us all. I regret I did not see her before she passed. I really do. This is also my reminder to invest the time where it counts with friends and family old and new. I’m so sorry for your loss and I hope that this collection of my memories bring something to your memories of her.


"

"Cheryl is my step-sister. Our parents married when we were adults, but I spent many holidays with her and her family over the last years and I consider her family. I remember how welcoming and friendly Cheryl was to me. I felt comfortable around her from the first time we met and looked forward to being able to talk with her. Cheryl and I both lived in West Seattle and for a time we would occassionally ride the same bus together. I always enjoyed her company and hearing about how her kids were doing. Cheryl is an amazing woman who will live on in my heart."

"Cheryl and I were friends in the youth group at East Shore Unitarian Church. We went to yruu youth group conferences together. We laughed at the word "overt". I miss you Cheryl and I'm sorry we didn't keep better in touch. Namaste"

"Cheryl and I were friends and roommates in college. There is so much that makes me sad about her death, there's no way to encapsulate it all in this little on-line fragment.

What I most want to say is for Clara and August. Cheryl was so clear about what she valued, and so open in her pursuit of being the person she wanted to become. I expect she must have thought deeply about the kind of parent she wanted to be, too, and that she was likely mindful and proactive with her chance to love in such a way, and bring goodness into the world by bringing a feeling of both safety and freedom to her kids so they could grow up to be spectacular people. (And she would have edited that run-on sentence!)

Clara and August, I especially want you to know that, for all the seriousness of your Mom's approach to things and the seriousness that must have come to all of you during her illness, she was also crazy fun. I have so many memories of her just being kick-in-the-pants funny. I can think of a million little jokes she made, or funny things she did, and it was always all the more impactful because she seemed so quiet on the surface.

She was also inspirational in that she pursued what she wanted to do. That seems simple on the surface, but the truth is most people don't do that. Most people say they want to be this thing or that, but they stop themselves because they don't think they really deserve it, or they think they're not cool enough, or the reality is they just don't have the discipline. Cheryl never got bogged down with that kind of thinking. Without fanfare or bragging, she just did what she wanted to do, and took it all a step at a time.

When she was in college, she was grounded by her faith and by her focus, but she was also someone who took emotional risks at times in order to experience joy and just be alive. She must have been tortured by the idea of leaving you, and you must be heartbroken, but I know she would want you to have that same great feeling of just being alive and young and awake to the world. Were she alive and able to watch you grow, the Cheryl I knew would have loved and supported every artistic impulse you had, and would have had your back in supporting any which way you wanted to grow and be, even if it didn't fit the mainstream, and even if she worried that it might cause you a little pain. She was intellectual, feminist, a good friend, a stable person, a strong personality, a film maker, and person who saw patterns (literally and figuratively). She was creative, and a good cook.

Mostly, to me, she was a good friend, and I hope you will be lucky enough to have at least one friend in your life such as your mom was to me."

"I was so sorry to hear of Cheryl's passing, more so since I was so late in finding out about it.

Cheryl and I worked together at Safeco Insurance. We started there as contractors at about the same time.

Cheryl's telling of her family and their experiences and adventures in their home and neighborhood were always entertaining but mostly side-splitting. She truly loved her family more then herself.

It is for them that I'm writing this. I wish you much comfort and the joy of your mom's memories for as long as you live.

I lost my wife, Maris, to metasticized liver cancer in 2002. When they meet in heaven, their will be thunderous laughter here on Earth.

Rick Fournier
Charlotte, North Carolina"