Alane “Lanie” Joy (Finley) Lee

September 28, 1948- September 1, 2024
In the evening of September 1st, Alane “Lanie” Joy Lee passed away peacefully among close family in Chico California. After years staying active while managing the progression of COPD followed by a diagnose of stage 4 Cancer this Spring, Lanie spent a busy three months highlighted by visiting and reminiscing with family, eating favorite foods, and pampering her chihuahua Betty. She was about to turn 76. She was preceded in death by her husband Thomas Lee, her parents John and Nellie Finley and her sister Karen (Lowell) Wysong. She is survived by her children Brett (Laura) Lee, Kim Chapman, and Lance (Montana) Lee, her grandchildren Brogan, Thomasin, Gabriel, and Vincent Lee, her sister Paula (Verne) Telken, and many cousins, nieces, nephews, and friends.
Lanie had a happy childhood in Bath, Maine with her sisters Karen and Paula, where she showed talent in creative arts and diving. She blazed a challenging path thru life: married at 17 and raising 3 kids at 22, she was proud of working for a multi-millionaire philanthropist, selling real estate, operating a dry cleaning business, pursuing entrepreneurial ventures including marketing her own Sea Breeze brand of aloe health products, writing freelance, promoting music acts, earning undergrad and graduate degrees, and writing, staging, and acting in plays. Lanie’s persistent and emphatic voice and pen championed the interests of the little guy. She lobbied for important causes, both global and personal in scale, and found success delivering legal arguments.
Her family thanks her for sharing her love of music, theater, and swimming and for preparing family favorites including stroganoff, applesauce cake, and Italian sandwiches. We’ll also think of her every time Michigan T. Frog the singing and dancing cartoon frog appears, when songs from her record collection play, and when her favorite BBC comedies and dramas air.
Lanie made many cross-country road trips, visiting with family and friends and exploring new adventures. She lived in Maine, Virginia, Minnesota, Montana, Ohio, Wisconsin, Arizona, and California—but frequently enjoyed returning to Maine and eventually retreated north to her cabin in the woods of Lee Maine. She delighted in studying play writing abroad in England and loved her extended visit with family in Hawaii. Later in life she again read classic stories, acted out her plays, sang, and played with her grandkids, as she had with her kids.
Lanie celebrated and shared the simple and small things in life, from using dramatic hand flourishes as she spoke to collecting mementos from nature and her travels. While she dreamt big and worked hard, she enjoyed her journey and stopped to smell the roses, as expressed in her favorite Billy Joel song “Vienna waits for you.”
Instead of gifts or flowers, the family asks for donations to go to a local animal rescue adoption center, as Lanie so deeply loved her animal companions and always found her furry friends at local shelters. She will be greatly missed and always in our loving memory.