Born 1/31/1953
Fort Lauderdale, Florida
Died 3/15/2023
Plainfield, Vermont
Details of Services
Friends are encouraged to post photos and memories at this link, and to attend a memorial gathering in her honor in Brattleboro, Vermont on June 17th, 2023 at 118 Elliot Street from 12 to 6pm, with a brief group remembrance at 3pm. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made in Sarah’s honor to Bayada Hospice, which provided care for her at the end, at 3543 Mountain View Drive, Suite 305, Colchester, VT 05446, or to the Vermont Institute of Natural Sciences (VINS), PO Box 1281, Queechee, VT 05059, at www.vinsweb.org, for her love of science, the natural world and birds.
Sarah Reynolds Edwards, who called Vermont home since the 1970’s, died peacefully in her home on March 15, 2023, with her husband and children by her side. A celebratory memorial service will be held at 118 Elliot St. in Brattleboro, Vermont on June 17th, 2023. For further details please visit www.forevermissed.com/sarahedwards where friends are encouraged to post photos and memories.
Sarah was born January 31, 1953, in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, daughter of Joan Edgar and Jackson Lane Edwards Jr. with siblings Joan, Jane, and Jackson. She grew up in Fort Lauderdale, spending summers in Maine on Bustins Island, where she met Heidi Clarke and family, of Sow and Pigs Island. As a teenager, Betty & Eric Clarke invited her to live in their Lexington, Mass home, where she became an unofficial member of the Clarke family and finished high school.
Sarah was tenacious. She graduated from Marlboro College in 1978 after initially having received a rejection letter from the admissions department, with the reason being that she “didn’t know how to write.” In response to the rejection, she replied that it was due to her inability to write that Marlboro College was in fact the perfect place for her; if she was already good at it, she would have applied elsewhere! The letter convinced them, and she was accepted. She completed her B.S. in Biology/Ecology, with a focus on Ornithology. While at Marlboro, she met her first husband, Tom Toleno, became a stepparent to his sons Tristan and Robban and a few years later gave birth to their two beloved children, Yves and Elizabeth.
Sarah was the owner of two shops in Brattleboro, 101 Main and The Fair Exchange. Her eye for beauty and style were put to use there, bringing a certain much-needed funkiness to town in the late 1980s.
In the 1990’s Sarah received her Master of Arts in Organizational Behavior from Antioch University New England, in Keene, NH. She served on the Brattleboro Selectboard, as well as the Board of Directors for both the Brattleboro Food Co-op & Brattleboro Area Hospice.
Sarah’s intensity was matched by her irreverence, her sense of purpose, and her joy. She was a woman who truly saw what is breathtaking in the natural beauty of our world, and who never lost her sense of humor. Guided by her ever-present curiosity, she made her way to interesting places and met fascinating people. She had many stories to tell, from a front row seat at the 1969 Apollo 11 space launch, living in Iran when she was 18, attending Jimi Hendrix’s last concert on the Isle of Wight, to marching with Elizabeth at the Million Women’s March (twice!) and helping form the conservation ethos for the family project at Long Caye Belize.
Sarah was fully alive. These qualities were some of what caught the attention of Blake Ross, the love of her life, who would become her husband in 1993. Together they wholly enjoyed a partnership built on respect, humor, joy, and always love.
Her passion for free-speech, civic engagement, and justice issues led to her work at the Center for Living Democracy in Brattleboro, and then to her successful tenure in the Vermont State Legislature, representing Brattleboro’s District 3 from 2000-2010. She was a fierce advocate for workers’ rights and fought hard for policies focused on nuclear waste disposal, and environmental and social justice. Though the work was serious, it was also exhilarating. Sarah and her colleagues in the trenches became very close friends. She sparkled with purpose and joy in the work and earned the nickname “Lemon Drop” from her compatriots. After leaving the Legislature, she and Blake moved to Columbus, Ohio, to care for family there. In Columbus, she became the Executive Director of Simply Living, a long-lived community organization whose mission is to create a compassionate and sustainable world through personal, community and cultural transformation. She reveled in bringing awareness to sustainable businesses and connecting people in Columbus.
In 2019, Sarah and Blake moved back to their beloved Vermont, into an apartment in the home of her daughter Elizabeth and son-in-law Timothy. In 2021, she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer – her immediate reaction was… “whaddya gonna do?” Though she was up front about the fact that pancreatic cancer is a beastly disease, she was fully aware that she was one of the “lucky” ones, for whom the treatments were not terrible, and life was very good. Rather than dwell on the difficulties of her health situation, she continued to embrace the beauty, humor, and joy of life even when it became apparent that treatments were no longer effective. In the face of that bad news, her response was to tell funny old stories, listen to her favorite music, drink champagne with her family and make sure her people knew how much she loved them.
Sarah’s life was shaped by her parents and Betty & Eric Clarke, who predeceased her. She is survived by her husband Blake, son Yves, his wife Lauren, and grandchildren Hamilton and Theodore Toleno of Nashville, TN, and daughter Elizabeth and husband Timothy Llewelyn of Plainfield, VT. Also surviving are her siblings, Joan Bottkol, Jane Edwards and Jackson Edwards, III, her father-in-law James Patrick Ross, and sister/brother-in-law Sarah Eagleson and Benson Ross, stepsons Tristan and Robban Toleno, and the Clarke siblings, Rebecca (Pogo), Hans, Heidi Palmer, Benjamin, and Abigail Karner.
There is much to be learned from Sarah’s legacy of effervescent purpose. A transcendent look into her life is represented by the bumper sticker she placed on one of her favorite cars, it read, “Don’t Postpone Joy.” Sarah lived this to the end.