Heidi Haffner Finser
October 16, 1951 – April 7, 2021
Heidi crossed the threshold at home surrounded by her family (husband Mark Finser, daughter Yohanna Finser and son Benjamin Finser). These biographical sharings were spoken at a gathering on June 13, 2021, in Mill Valley, California, to celebrate Heidi’s life. Eulogy by Rev. Michael Latham, priest of The Christian Community of San Francisco Being a newly ordained priest, I’ve experienced many firsts. Two were with Heidi, the sacrament of the last anointing and her funeral service. And it was more than perfect because Heidi helped me. She was working to support both the sacrament and the funeral service. When we witness a young child, we see hands reaching out to touch, to explore everything with wonder and enthusiasm. As adults we begin our day by touching the water that runs through our hands when we bathe, the clothes we put on, our thoughts when they touch the air as we speak. In our soul, we can be touched too. When someone acts lovingly a golden ray comes toward us, and we say, I am touched. And when someone touches us in this way, we open like a flower, a warm breath flows into our hearts and a healing balm for our soul. Heidi was born Heidi Haffner to a father, Wilhelm, and a mother Gerda, on October 16, 1951, in Uslar, Germany, a small town in lower Saxony. The family lived and worked in a micro brewery begun by her great-grandfather. She joined a brother Henrich, four years her senior. One year later she was joined by her sister Ulla. Heidi’s father Wilhelm had experienced medical problems from internment during World War II, and he suffered an embolism and died. Young Heidi touched death at the tender age of five. When she was six and playing with her five-year-old sister, a motorcyclist in the grip of alcohol ran over her sister and sped away. Heidi was found on the side of the road, holding her dead sister, touching death a second time. She entered school in the fall, but was disconnected to her studies and unable to learn. Yet something golden was trying to touch her. Her mother Gerda had heard about a school that might help and brought Heidi to a Waldorf school about 50 •
being human
100 kilometers north in Hanover. While her brother Henrich went to boarding school, Heidi and Gerda rented a room in Hanover during the week, and developed what was to be a lifelong connection to this new education and to each other. We could perhaps imagine Heidi silently holding these childhood tragedies deep within her breath, yet gently being touched by the healing rays of Waldorf education and eurythmy. At nine years old, a brother Martin joined the family. Heidi adored her new sibling and was like a second mother to him. Over the next few years she moved around Europe with her mother and her younger brother to the UK, Switzerland, and France; she entered many Waldorf schools and graduated in 1969. Now very talented in languages, Heidi moved at 18 to Oxford to study at a secretarial school, but knew in her heart, this was not truly for her. She went to Stuttgart where during a week-long orientation weaving all the anthroposophical streams, her heart was touched as she realized that eurythmy was her path. At 21, she entered the Vienna Eurythmy School headed by two very strong and profound teachers; this early training left indelible impressions on her soul. An American family, the Sharp family, entered the lives of Heidi and her family. They had met at a Waldorf school, the Ecole Montliea in Chamby, Switzerland, and the families became lifelong friends. Her mother Gerda came to the United States to live in Los Angeles in the early seventies and ran a new-age bookstore with her good friend, Betty Sharp. In 1975, Heidi received her eurythmy diploma and for the next few years she performed, ethereal and sprightly, joyful and harmonious, a quality that moved space itself. Eurythmy spoke in her and through her. In 1977 Heidi traveled all over Europe with a renowned London eurythmy group. She then came to live in the US and Los Angeles. The West Coast was calling her, as well as her mother. In 1983, living in Los Angeles she found a small cabin in Malibu as her home. There was a raging Santa Ana fire threatening the area. She was to go out early to a rehearsal. Wondering if she should leave, she was told that the winds had changed direction and the fire was heading away from her location. She went out with only her cello. The fires changed direction. When she returned, everything was gone. All her treasures, her books, her notations