CLAIRE ULAM WEINER JULY 15, 1944 - DECEMBER 18, 2020

Claire Ulam Weiner was born in Los Alamos in 1944. Her father, the Polish mathematician Stanislaw Ulam, had been recruited to join the Manhattan Project by his friend John von Neumann. Her mother, Francoise Aron, was just pregnant with her when the couple made the trek to the top-secret City Upon a Hill. Claire was one of the first babies born during the Manhattan Project; the address on her birth certificate was a post office box. She grew up surrounded by the great minds of the Nuclear Age, and their eccentricity and brilliance infused her own. She developed a voracious appetite for insights and information—whether consumed in one of the many newspapers and websites and newsletters she read daily, or untraditionally, from her love of mystery stories. Everywhere she went in the world, her first steps were to procure the local paper and to buy a mystery that was set there.

She was what many people would describe as worldly—the child of extraordinary European parents, fluent in three languages, instinctively attuned to global issues. She was also intensely and above all a local, with roots so broad and deep in the different communities of Santa Fe that she was in many ways of the city. As a young woman she lived in Washington, DC, working on Capitol Hill; in London, where she worked in publishing; in France, where she passed many visits with our French family; in Colorado, where she met and married my father; and in California, where I was born. But her true and rightful place in the universe was here in Santa Fe, where she returned with me and my father, Dr. Steve Weiner, to start his orthopedic surgery practice in 1978. Her work was an extension of her character: social worker, marital therapist, discharge planner. She was deeply involved in politics, particularly on the local level. My parents had an extremely close and loving relationship. They were together side by side in all things until she died. She meant the world to him.

“Oh, goody! Tell me something interesting” she would say when I called her. To whatever thoughts and anecdotes I offered, she would always provide animated feedback. In reality, though, she was the one who always had something interesting to say—commentary about current events, news of our friends’ lives, little tidbits that immediately brought me into her world and worldview, with all of her warmth and vibrancy.

She welcomed people into her life with generous enthusiasm, providing them with support, resources, and advice (whether sought or not). Even as a teenager, the person I always wanted to talk to most at a party was my mother, who was often to be found in spirited debate about some big issue of the day. She was a truly original thinker. “Wanna make a bet?” she would ask, when confronting a more conventional view. She was mostly right, always ahead of her time.

She was led by her extraordinary intuition, an ability to know and understand people that was sometimes disconcerting to be on the other end of, as it was often coupled with unfiltered guidance. “Ask Claire Five Dollars” was a refrain that echoed in our household, and she would always answer—thoughtfully, honestly, kindly, helpfully. Growing up, my friends would frequently seek her out for counsel, and she would invariably keep their secrets. As I transitioned from daughterhood to motherhood, and she to grandmotherhood, she became counsel of a deeper sort. This is particularly precious now; if she cannot be here with her grandchildren I can at least impart her influence.

Words can only capture so much of what made my mother so unique, so irrepressible and irreplaceable: she was vivacious, funny, prescient, intuitive, loyal, and utterly authentic. She was endlessly curious and cheerfully cynical. She was matter-of-fact, with unwavering integrity, and was totally immune to the trappings of success or status or fame. She was a bright star, with so much wonder in her orbit. Her passing leaves the world a dimmer, colder place.

“I got the idea,” she would often say, in the middle of a movie or play or book that she didn’t feel the need to finish. I envied her efficiency, the way she was unfettered by indecision, or the need to hang on, or regret. She made up her mind and stuck to her guns, and she always left the party early. This was shatteringly true of her death as well.

As she was larger than life, so will she be larger than death, forever remaining part of the lives of the multitudes who loved her. “Never say goodbye,” she would always say when we were parting ways, “just say see you later.”

Claire is survived by her husband, Dr. Steve Weiner, her daughter, Rebecca Ulam Weiner, her son-inlaw, Drake Park Bennett, and her two grandsons, Xavier (5) and Damian (3).

A memorial service will be announced at a later date.