Colette Relation Cuozzo

All that divides Sea Cliff from Glen Cove is the center line of Glen Cove Avenue, and Colette’s parents moved across the street so she and her sisters could go to kindergarten in Sea Cliff. They had been living in the big house connected to her grandparents’ butcher shop and bar. From first to third grades she attended St. Boniface. Her father did not want the kids to go to Sea Cliff school but when they got “nits in our hair” he said, “If you get nits in your head again, you can go.” When they returned home a second time with a case of the nits, they transferred to Sea Cliff school. (Some of us remember that the fear of nits, head lice, caused our parents to ban us from attending the Cove Theatre because it had the nickname “Cootie Palace.”)

In school her enthusiasms lay outside the classroom. That enthusiasm made her head JV cheerleader in our sophomore and junior years. “I wasn’t that great in school,” she says. “I was good at gym and I was good at lunch.” She often worked in the school cafeteria in her free period, then when her turn to eat came, she received a free lunch. She also worked at the St. Christopher Home for children next to the North Shore Country Club. She says she had few girlfriends and most of her friends were boys. One of her few good friends among the girls was Lee Berroyer. They drifted around town together having “a lot of fun” and spent many evenings together at the Youth Center.

In our junior year Colette and Richie Smith left school and married. Richie took a job driving a milk delivery truck. Their son Richard was born in 1956 and now lives in Roanoke, VA working as head of maintenance in the post office. Their daughter Jill born in ’62 works in a home for handicapped adults. Their son Ronald born in ’61 owns his own truck on Long Island doing contract pick up and delivery.

In 1963 Richie and Colette divorced but remain very good friends and occasionally visit. He lives in Delaware. “He’s like my brother I never had.” Colette began to work at Roman’s clothing store in Huntington. In the earlyl 80s friends called and invited her to a party at their home, saying “Two guys coming from Flushing. Maybe you can hook up with one of them.” One didn’t show, but she did hook up with the other, Richard Cuozzo and four years later they married. Richard had never been married and had no children. Colette’s three kids loved him. Colette and Richard soon had a son, Gary.

In 1987 with Gary in elementary school, Colette returned to her old job—working in the high school cafeteria and “I loved it. I could relate to the kids in the school.” Richard retired from his plumbing work and began to work part time driving a school bus. Today they have nine grandchildren from 3 to 30. Colette is still close to her identical twin sisters, Marsha and Sandra and they celebrate their March birthdays with a trip every year. With her daughter she enjoys attending NASCAR races though Richard says he doesn’t want to sit and watch “cars going round and round a track.” With Richard Colette enjoys visiting nearby casinos at Orient Point, Yonkers, Connecticut and Atlantic City.

In 2000 Colette battled her way through colon cancer and chemotherapy. When she had breast cancer three years ago she lost her hair to chemotherapy and her grandchildren told her, “You look like Uncle Fester.” (The famously bald member of the ghoulish Addams Family.) She laughed with them and said, “I hope it comes in better than when it went out. Wished for curls. It was a big joke.” Colette still laughs about it. “When you got cancer, you gotta fight,” she says. “I’ll be here forever and ever. Only the good die young.”