DeLoris Ahlin

Damariscotta - DeLoris Ahlin, 93, passed away peacefully from natural causes on Wednesday, February 10, 2021. 

DeLoris, known as “Dee” to many of her numerous friends, had recently moved to Damariscotta from Portland. Born in Sioux City, Iowa, to Per and Dora Wogberg, she was nicknamed “Sister” by her three strapping brothers, and enjoyed playing hide and seek in the endless cornfields. Finding refuge in the local public library, she fell in love with books and learning, beginning a lifelong passion that inspired so many in her life.

DeLoris spent her teen years in Los Angeles, where she relished summers with friends at her favorite hangout, Huntington Beach. She later married and started her family, settling in Monterey Park. She moved on to Houston, TX, Chappaqua, NY, and then to Cape Cod before settling in Portland, where she resided for several years. DeLoris loved the open sky and beauty of her adopted state, and for someone who treasured views and vistas, Maine was a feast. One of the last things she did was enjoy Gardens Aglow at the Coastal Botanical Gardens – “it made my Christmas,” she said.

After raising four extremely creative children, DeLoris made a bold decision: She chose to get a college degree and begin a new career of her own. She attended Pace University before receiving a Bachelor of Arts from Sarah Lawrence College, a Master of Science from the University of Bridgeport, and a Master of Science in Social Work from Columbia University, all after the age of 50. She parlayed one of her best personal traits, being an unusually good listener, into a lifetime of helping others. She worked as a counselor and director of workshops in individual, couples, group, and family therapy. She was certified in Transactional Analysis, as well as being a Licensed Clinical Social Worker in New York, Massachusetts, and Maine. DeLoris continued to counsel people via the internet into her 90s. She showed great wisdom and compassion by genuinely caring about the things others cared about.

Her interests and hobbies reflected her great intellectual curiosity. Book clubs, bridge clubs, writing workshops, volunteering, and people watching filled her spare time. While a licensed real estate broker and a Feng Shui consultant, DeLoris practiced another huge passion in her life - interior decorating. She kept a warmly welcoming, beautiful home wherever she lived and helped others do the same. Her children, when visiting, were often asked to move a piece of furniture an inch or so, to be “just right.” Remarkably good with her hands, DeLoris would sew costumes for her children’s many theatrical adventures, do daily crosswords, prepare traditional Swedish dishes to perfection, and joyfully but ruthlessly win family card games by flashily laying down the perfect hand. She’d pore over photo albums, discarding pictures that had no people in them, but advising a granddaughter that she probably didn’t need five pictures of each of her five kids, “just pick the best two of each.” Her green thumb was legendary; she knew too much care is as bad as too little. She even managed to travel the world, visiting England, Scotland, Greece, China, Sweden, and her mother’s home village in Norway, where DeLoris was recognized by a long-time resident as being “Dora’s daughter” even though her mother had left over 50 years earlier.

DeLoris will be truly missed, as many of her friends and relatives described her as creative, patient, perceptive, wise, intellectual, compassionate, generous, and a great friend. Those that knew her well found her interesting, fun, always up for an adventure, forward-looking and independent to the last. DeLoris explored new ways of thinking and was open to all interesting ideas. She was a free spirit in the best sense of the word – relentlessly curious about the world and the people in it, fluid, happy to roam or to sit quietly and take in the view. She inspired all who knew her. 

She is survived by her four loving children; Robert of Raleigh, NC, Constance and John of New York, NY, and Margit of Boothbay Harbor, ME, as well as their spouses, and also her ex-husband, Jack Ahlin of Cape Cod, MA. She is also greatly missed by her extended family, which includes her five grandchildren and fifteen great-grandchildren.

We would like to thank the heroic doctors and nurses at LincolnHealth – Miles Campus for caring for her, and allowing family to be with her in her final hours.  

A memorial service will be held, pandemic willing, on July 2nd in mid-coast Maine.

To anyone considering a memorial donation in DeLoris' name, as a lover of both Nature and the Arts, she would favor the Audubon Center, Museum, Theater or Opera Group in your area. 

Please visit DeLoris’ memorial page at the Strong-Hancock Funeral Home link: https://www.stronghancock.com/obituary/DeLoris-Ahlin 

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