THIELE, Amy May 17, 1949 - September 23, 2015 On September 23 2015 my beloved sister traded in her broom for a pair of wings to fly off on the next part of her journey.

Amy was born in Spokane Washington.

Mother, Lucile, was an innocent grade school teacher and shop girl with an amazing singing voice.

In 1947 a colleague asked her to sing at her wedding.

At the rehearsal dinner she met the bride’s brother a tall, dark, handsome wicked fly boy and it was love.

Father, George, the dashing pilot was still in the Army Air Corp.

They were married 6 months later.

Amy’s school years were notable for many things but mainly for striking terror into the hearts of some of her teachers because at a young age it was obvious that she was smarter than they were.

Her 8th grade science teacher had her writing tests instead of taking them because she screwed up the grading curve.

Fellow students called her Univac.

She was in the top 10 in the National Merit Scholarship, graduated valedictorian from West Valley High School in Spokane (1967), and won a scholarship to Cornell University to study physics.

Our parents laughed about a woman with a physics degree and discouraged her from going.

While she didn’t go to Cornell their scorn convinced her to quit living with them.

This was supposed to be a lighthearted rememberance but at this point I realized that her life became as tragic as it was comic.

Depression is an ugly disease.

Amy and I referred to it as the black hole, the gloom, the sloth monster.

It is chronic.

It requires treatment that few doctors understand or are qualified to treat.

Many of us self-medicate.

Directly or indirectly depression is often fatal.

Nobody wants to talk about it including Amy.

I wanted to paint a word picture of my sister.

I hope she appreciates my adjectives and alliteration and I hope she forgives my comma placement.

My sister was: Brilliant, beautiful and brave.

Funny, fiery and fragile.

Loving, loyal and lost.

Wise and weird and wonderful.

I have never had to live without her.

She is survived my me, sister Lori, brother-in-law Kevin and nephew Kendall.

She also had some very good friends - you know who you are.

Donations in Amy’s name can be made to the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, 5455 Almira Dr NE, Bremerton, WA 98311.