Kip's mother. 92 years old and still worth calling.
She entered my orbit because she’s Kip's mother, but that’s not why she stayed. Wit, warmth, the unselfconscious frankness of someone who has seen enough of the world to dispense with pretense. I’ve been her computer support for years. 185 emails document a real friendship.
Her husband Marvin Corwin was a Madison Avenue adman — one of the original Mad Men era figures, connected to the “I’d like to buy the world a Coke” campaign. She has a different story, her own story, that I’ve been slow to get in writing.
She was in a serious automobile crash as a young woman. She’s a mixed media artist — paints, handmade paper, found objects. Her apartment is full of art. She worked as a docent giving architectural tours of the Salk Institute.
The clearest window into her character: on the drive home from Burning Man 1997, Kip and I had an argument about breastfeeding. Kip was against; I was for. At some point we called Ellen from the road. Her response: “I didn’t, but I probably should have.”
That’s the whole story. She didn’t hedge, moralize, or deflect. Just answered directly and let the absurdity of the situation speak for itself.
As of 2026 she’s 92 and moving into a care home. I went to see her in May, possibly one of the last extended visits. She’s part of my support network in a way that would be hard to explain to anyone who didn’t watch it develop over twenty-five years.