03/12/2026
"Orchard Cove is a community where everyone is working toward the same goals. The community's support for one another is palpable," said resident Phyllis Cash.
Cash moved into the community in August 2025 from New York. She had a lengthy career in education, teaching in both the United States and Japan, including more than 30 years with the English department at Lehman College in the Bronx.
"I was at Lehman College for a very long time. I taught expository writing, including research papers and essays where the purpose was to convince the reader of the point of view of the writer. I had written books and articles about the process behind that kind of research," Cash said, noting that the advent of computer technology and the internet changed how research was done.
One challenge students faced was sourcing their papers. As a teacher, Cash stressed the importance of proper research, writing a bibliography, and including footnotes. "If you want to write a serious research paper in an American school, you have to learn all of that," she said.
While teaching at Lehman College, her dean was part of the International Rotary Club, where he met a Japanese businessman interested in establishing an American-style higher education facility in Japan. This led to the creation of a City University of New York annex campus in Hiroshima. Cash was invited to serve as director for the school, the Color Test Institute. The institute taught about color theory and proficiency, how to identify colors, the names and historical context of colors, and more. Being stationed in Japan meant she would be away from her husband Mark for a year.
"Immediately, friends thought we were getting divorced because I'm going away and Mark was staying here. We weren't getting divorced. In fact, the Japanese sponsor provided free transportation for my husband and kids to come visit me," she said.
Cash also served as a founding member of the Lincoln Center Institute for the Arts in Education, which encourages and celebrates lifelong learning through the arts.
"Lincoln Center is the center of performing arts in New York, which means it is the center of performing arts in the world," she said, noting she was involved in bringing performers from around the world, including tango dancers from South America and a Chinese opera group, to New York to interact with and educate students from the Bronx.
"To have these kids from the Bronx mixing with troupes from different countries and different cultures was an extraordinary experience," Cash said.
Following her husband's death, Cash was living alone in New York. Her children were worried, and with two of them living in Massachusetts, the move to Orchard Cove brought her closer to family. Cash has three sons, Syd, Dave, and Steven, as well as six grandchildren.
"I love them, and they're funny. It is a lot of laughing, and laughter is a gift of the gods," Cash said.
She is impressed with the community at Orchard Cove.
"I find the people are wonderful. They are just so welcoming," she said. "The stories here that people have! But you have to ask them the right questions. When you unlock those stories, it is amazing."
Cash also praised the programs at Orchard Cove, including the art class taught by fellow resident and artist Edie Green and the concerts performed in the ballroom.
"We lived in Manhattan. We were opera goers, concert goers, and museum goers. The works that we see here, the concerts and so on, are of the quality that would match what I saw in the city," Cash said.
She also praised the food.
"I came here, and I was very, very impressed. We had dinner at Pequit and my eldest son, Steven, said, 'This isn't a retirement home, this is a resort, and the food is delicious!'" Cash said.
