FRANKLIN - Carolyn Rice Nohria, 70, departed this life on Thursday, Oct. 28, 2021.
Many souls leave this world for the next at sunrise and sunset and at the changing of the tides. Something in nature or time and space sees to that—it’s a mystery, and if ever there was a soul who’d take advantage of a mystery it was Carolyn Nohria. And she did, when she traded in the pains and cares of her earthly life for the great adventure that lay before her on Thursday, Oct. 28 just moments before a splendid harvest-red sunrise split the darkness of the disap-pearing night.
Ms. Nohria was born in Franklin, North Carolina, the daughter of the late Virgil Garverson Rice and Kathryn Elizabeth Tallent Rice. In addition to her parents, she was preceded in death by a brother, Johnny Virgil Rice.
She is survived by three children, Renee Kirkland Cooney of Franklin, David Kirkland of Franklin, and Patrick Nohria of Asheville; six grandchildren, Zachary Kirkland, Lindsay Owenby, Julie Cooney, Dawson Kirkland, Dillon Kirkland, Riece Kirkland and one great-grandchild, Ellee Thomason; three sisters, Pat Ensley of Franklin, Audrey Clark of Franklin, and Christy Armstrong of Andrews.
Ms. Nohria was a 1969 graduate of Franklin High School, a graduate of Western Carolina University with a BS in nursing, and a graduate of UNC at Chapel Hill with a master’s in public health. She began her career in nursing in hospitals and health departments in Western North Carolina before advancing to pediatric neurology at Duke Hospital. She finished her career in nursing as a nurse for Smart Start in the western region of North Carolina.
An avid reader, researcher, and world traveler, Ms. Nohria, as the Whitman poem said, “Contained Multitudes.” At any given time she might have been found walking ancient battlefields in England, visiting castles, sipping tea with friends and family, losing herself in study, archiving pictures, or searching for rarities in small thrift stores wherever she might find herself.
A devotee to all things unusual, unsolved, mysterious or unknown, Ms. Nohria was constantly ask-ing the question—why not? And it was her insatiable appetite for learning and her openness to possibilities that fed her vast knowledge on so many topics. She was a walking encyclopedia of her ancestral and genealogical history, and no less an expert on local and Cherokee history.
With a truly beautiful open mind, heart and soul, Ms. Nohria blended her love of history and the unknown seamlessly, and in doing so crafted a manner of living, a philosophy, a belief system that the greatest minds of all time might have praised.
Ms. Nohria truly lived life. She loved authentically. She spoke truth and expected no less than truth from others. Her sincere love of God’s mystical plan guided her actions and her words.
This world and her family suffered a great loss when Carolyn Nohria left on the sunrise, but the mists of time gained a treasure— a wise, intelligent, loving, spirited, funny, genuine treasure.
The family received friends from 5 to 7 p.m. on Monday Nov. 1, 2021, at Macon Funeral Home. A funeral service was held Tuesday, Nov. 2, 2021, at 11 a.m. in the chapel of Macon Funeral Home.
Online condolences can be made at www.maconfuneralhome.com. Macon Funeral Home is handling the arrangements.