Deb Horen

Deb Horen died peacefully at home in Brisbane, California on October 26th of cancer. She is celebrated by her son Elliot, best friend June, sister Joleen, and a spirited band of friends and coworkers collected over 68 years.

Deb left home at seventeen in a brown VW Squareback and never took her foot off the gas. She traded straight-A report cards for scholarships at Sonoma State, San Francisco State, and USC film school, where her radical feminist films somehow failed to find an audience with the overwhelmingly male faculty. She took her multimedia chops to San Francisco, producing equally radical features and PSAs for city agencies.

She had a son and moved to San Diego in search of better public schools, breaking a promise to her teenage self to never move back to the 'burbs. A familiar face in K-6 classrooms, she made valiant attempts to teach children to type without looking at the keys and find more than one player for dreidel at holiday parties. A conversation on the sidelines of a Little League game led to an instructional design job, which blossomed into her second career as an HR leader in biotechnology.

Deb was a staunch advocate for whole grain everything. A hiker who saw canopies as cathedrals. An activist who championed nature and her communities. She preached persistence and reinvention, often counseling "whether you believe you can or you can't, you're right."

Deb tended to believe that she could do anything, and she tended to be right. She will be remembered for the way she ignited that spark in others, making all of us believe that we too could shape ourselves and the world for the better.

If you wish to give, please send donations to Clearity Foundation, which provides free services to women with ovarian and other gynecological cancers: www.clearityfoundation.org/donate/