The melancholy of Irish ancestry that weaved a highway of happiness braided with heartbreak marked the enveloping tones of a celebration of Carol Layana’s life this morning at St. Augustine Catholic Church.
A shoulders-strong, communally prominent businesswoman before it was fashionable, first at the Culver City News, later at the Culver City Observer, she rose, seamlessly and determinedly, fast and far above setbacks before it became stylish to call single mothers heroic.
Haunting traditional Irish melodies, performed by Ralph and Victoria Mohutsky, bracketed the family-centric service, just as a traditional Catholic, a mother of seven and the first-born of nine siblings, would expect.
Mortality was one theme strand. “As children of God,” said Father Alidor Mikobi, “we have come here not to celebrate her death but her life. She died at age 80. Not everyone lives until 80. This was a special blessing from God.
“In every life,” he said, “there are two main events, birth and death.”
Scanning the hundreds who had come to honor Ms. Layana, Father Mikobi said that “there is a date for death for everyone who is here.”
For Ms. Layana, the dates were May 15, 1935, in the heart of the Depression, and June 8.
Two weeks after her death at the age of 80, in a large church thronged with intimately connected family members, sentiment encircled, but did not dominate, the Mass by Father Alidor Mikobi.
It was remarked, more for the record than as a reminder to mourners, that Carol Louise Malloy Layana lost four of her five sons – Tim, Stephen, Matt and Michael — with jarring suddenness, and yet she kept on soaring until the tears were out of sight.
In the midst of recalling “magical Christmases” when the always fully packed Layana home on Rhoda Way was ringing with the joyful sounds of children opening stunning presents worthy of interminable squeals, daughter Nancy Layana Affinito remembered a scene from her teenage years.
Part of the setup was that in addition to breaking news, reality television shows, her sister weekends, Cheetos, margaritas and a home that always must be peopled to capacity, Ms. Layana maintained a police scanner. She had no idea one day it could come in handy.
On that certain day, Ms. Affinito’s brother Michael pulled into a service station, pumped gas and drove away without paying.
Hours passed. When Ms. Layana heard on her trusty scanner the description of the car and the license number, she spun into instant mother mode. When Michael came home, she not only ordered him to return to the station and fork over the reimbursement, he was to apologize.
“My mom was an incredible role model,” Ms. Affinito said.
Two of Ms. Layana’s brothers, Tom Malloy and John Malloy, are hospitalized. They sent their regrets at not being present.
John, however, insisted on having a recording of his memories delivered to St. Augustine.
Starting with his big sister Carol, John, fifth in the order of nine, said it was easy to remember of ages of his eight siblings.
“We were all born two years apart,” he said, “a form of Catholic birth control.”
