Full Message from Tom:

It is with great sadness to report that my consistent and loyal friend of 52 years, Norris Smith, died over the July 4th weekend. Yes, the tall, elegant lady who always wore a scarf (including in hospital) lost her valiant battle to remain with us. An avid listener with a voracious curiosity, she could filter questionable traits and personality quirks of the talker into a focused light so bright they thought they could be considered for a Nobel prize. From dedicated attendance at Film Forum to the annual pilgrimage to the Lincoln Center Film Festival to the weekly intake of NPR’s Car Talk (Norris never owned a car), it was life’s stories that provided her oxygen at a quantity higher than the 21% percent the rest of us survive on. Whether the doormen, the neighbors in the building or the Broadway pan handlers the loss of the lady with the scarf will be felt for a long time.

Editor – The H.W.Wilson Company had good reason to hang on to Norris for so long. Impatient with their incessant false pandering to employees, she shunned administration to concentrate on the authors, only some of whom could write. Regardless of ability, she homed in on what they were trying to express and ever conscious of egos would slide in the reality that it needed a rewrite. Authors would go silent for months, but then come tip toeing back to face up to the red inked galleys. Penny pinching administration was appalled at how long this all took, but sheepishly recognized the success of the company depended on its editorial acumen.

Gardener – I would argue that Norris holds the title for the longest, continuous caretaker of an individual community garden plot in NYC. For anyone familiar with the politics of community gardening in one of the most densely developed places on the planet, this is an award-winning feat. What is now known as the Garden Peoples Garden started in a mostly paved empty lot at the corner of Broadway and 96 Street. A typical overzealous developer/community activist dispute kept the lot empty for years and the hard surface slowly eroded into earth yielding plants. Not having legal status, the garden suffered some bizarre incidents like when “agitated, sweaty Jamaican bearing a machete chops heads off sunflower plants.” This was supposed to be proof that the whole city was under a violent crime wave, but in typical Norris’ response, she said “the maniac” was probably just after the seeds – “maybe he wanted to roast them”. As always, the developer won the battle erecting a banal monstrosity while providing a mechanical setback in constant shade as mitigation to the community garden. The indignity of growing in shallow, shaded troughs went on for years. But Norris endured until the garden finally came back to earth in its current Riverside Park at 90th Street location. Just recently, an unrelated acquaintance described how being stuck in the city, she wandered through Riverside Park coming across this “nice lady” tending to her garden. They started chatting and right in front of me she digs up a plant and gives it to me. I said, “I know who that was”.

Acute Listener – During a trip to southern Italy in the early 1980’s Norris and I found ourselves in a bustling Naples trattoria for dinner where there was a wait for table. No sooner were we seated when a youngish man (more international looking than Italian) appeared asking in mid-western accented English if he could share our table (a custom more practiced in Europe than the US when places get crowded). Norris was visibly suspicious, but we both said, “yes, of course”. His ease with the menu showed he had been in the country for a while and a Bolognese dish was quickly ordered. After some chit chat about the condition of Naple’s streets, he captivated us with an extraordinarily detailed account of how while on a hunting trip he “accidentally” shot and killed his brother. Eating rapidly and as soon as the last bit of pasta was consumed, he reaches into his pocket, pulls out a wad of lire and leaving it on the table exits just as mysteriously as he entered. My reaction was “What the f… just happened?’ Norris on the other hand was calmly mulling over his account considering the sequencing, the adjectives used and his lack of animation. She concluded the story was real and it was no “accident”.

Subversive – I met Norris in 1970 when we were weekly participants in an innovative group therapy that met in the psychoanalyst’s sprawling Central Park West apartment. Being New York, the group was diverse – a sociologist, a union laborer, a professor, and the wife of the producer of “Hair” who encouraged us to audition. When we protested that we were not actors, she said, “that’s ok, the play is not about anything, so it doesn't matter”. As patients, we were discouraged from learning any personal details of the group leader who spoke with a strong Portuguese accent. This triggered relentless inquiry and we eventually learned he was a political refugee (a family member had been assassinated) from Brazil. Still, he was an authority figure which gave Norris and I the right to make fun of him outside the group. His office and waiting room within the sprawl were appointed to perfection – moldings, beige walls, carefully framed prints hinting of impressionism, a quadruple door arrangement to prevent sound transmission, the radio permanently tuned to classical music set so low you could barely identify the piece. During one of our critical rants, I remarked on the potted plants that were impeccable except the specimens were being crowded out by weeds. There was a long pause with a sullen look and then Norris said, “I collected those seeds in Central Park and planted them in the pots”. Although I belonged to several radical organizations at the time, I knew I would not meet anyone else this subversive.

I ain’t lookin’ to compete with you
Beat or cheat or mistreat you
Simplify you, classify you
Deny, defy or crucify you
All I really want to do
Is, baby, be friends with you
Bob Dylan, 1964
(Not being edited by Norris, please excuse the dangling this and that in the grammar.) 

From Mary (niece): 

Norris was dearly loved by her friends and family.  She was an exceptionally thoughtful, introspective, considerate, and generous person.  She was an avid reader, a superb cruciverbalist, fond of music and movies, and a friend to all cats.

Norris painstakingly tended a plot at the Riverside Community Garden, where she shared her gardening knowledge, cuttings, and friendship.   She was a member of the Garden People for over 40 years!

Norris graduated Sweet Briar College with a bachelor’s degree in English in 1960.  Norris spent a year in Scotland as an exchange student at St. Andrews University.   Moving to New York City after graduation, she took graduate classes at Columbia University from 1960-1963 and began her career as a copy editor, ultimately working for H. W. Wilson and Company from 1971 until retirement.