McAllen recognizes retired educator

Nedra Kinerk. One of a kind. Always upbeat. In other words, after God made Nedra, He threw away the mold.

Petite, always smiling, even when she’s got a reason not to. Smile.

Like the terminal cancer diagnosis she received right around the holiday season: “The doctor told me I have months, not years, to live,” she said by phone this week. “So I take each day and find some reason to be happy.”

“Which was why, last week, inside McAllen City Hall, the mayor and commission awarded Nedra Kinerk with a proclamation naming Feb. 24, 2025, as “Nedra Kinerk Day.”

Just one more reason to smile and appreciate her many contributions to the community, county, in which she’s volunteered so much of her time over the years.

“Thank you for this honor from the city and friends that I truly love. I’m truly blessed with the number of you that I’ve worked with over all these years,” Kinerk said during the city’s presentation.

Nedra was McAllen’s Woman of the Year in 2014 before receiving the Citizenship Award in 2020, named in her honor, of which she spoke not long after its acceptance.

“That Citizens Award that (McAllen Mayor) Jim Darling and the city awarded me, that really meant a lot to me, especially since it was named ‘The Nedra Kinerk Citizenship Award.’ It still blows me away that they considered the things that I had done and was doing, because I just kind of figured these are things that I ought to be doing. No big deal. So, I am very grateful for that honor.”

A fixture in this community for approximately the last 30 years, Nedra helped cofound Futuro McAllen, a grassroots nonprofit focused on improving, sustaining quality of life elements, which then segued into Futuro RGV.

Dealing with Life

Still spry, with the abdominal cancer currently at bay, Nedra’s under hospice care (Amavi), and she says the staff couldn’t be kinder.

“The plan is to mitigate the pain,” she says, matter-of-factly.

Along the way, never forget the little things, she says.

“Even if it’s a dandelion sticking up through a crack in a sidewalk, its beauty is still worth celebrating.”

A petite, tough nut with a soft interior who only stands approximately 5’ 1”, Nedra has overcome adversities in her life, without ever sounding as though she’s been defeated, which includes the death of one of her daughters from brain cancer at the age of 53, and the death in 2010 of her husband of 59 years.

With a diagnosis of terminal cancer that began in her abdomen, 92-yearold Dr. Nedra Kinerk, EdD, says she always looks for something beautiful that will overcome the negative.

Rather than facing death as if it’s the final chapter, she considers it just one more stage in her existence, which will include facing God and re-connecting with lost family.

Until the cancer proves the winner, however, she will continue to concentrate on the good she still sees in this world.

“I have a lot of friends, and I’m very grateful for them. I'm very grateful that somehow my husband and I made the decision to come down to Texas to spend our retirement years. I never dreamed of living in Texas. When I was all those years in Indiana, Texas was the wild wooly west, but we got down here, and we liked the weather. We liked the people. Of course, (this area) was kind of a quaint, small (place) back in 1979 when we first came down. And we found we loved it here. The climate, the people. So we bought a small citrus grove (which the ’83 freeze killed). We became what you call Summer Texans (as opposed to Winter Texans), because of my free time from classes during the summer, which is when we would drive down (to the hundred-degree heat).”

Then in 1988, the Kinerks moved here full-time, and even after the loss of her husband and child, Nedra still calls this place home, and was still involved in local events until her illness struck last year.

She went through one extremely rough treatment, but the cancer cells had already metastasized, and by the time the oncologist saw her, he gave her less than six months to live, and the choice of either chemo or let nature take its course.

“The woman who helped me navigate the hospice care plan told me that when her mother got sick, they both did all they could to keep her alive. But in retrospect, in the end, both came to believe they all would have been better off just enjoying what time they had left without enduring the pain connected to the chemo. But everyone is different. For me, I decided to just enjoy whatever time I have left.”

Heaven Awaits

For Nedra Kinerk, part of her ability to navigate her terminal illness is her strong belief in God, Heaven, the belief that she will once again see her deceased husband, daughter. She can tell you stories about how her husband has showed her signs that his true essence survived death and that his soul lives on, no matter how the years pass by.

For the atheists of the world, these stories may sound fanciful, but Nedra Kinerk doesn’t judge people, no matter their beliefs. She’s not trying to proselytize, just simply explain how her belief in God, the Hereafter, is helping her deal with the here and now, which includes her terminal diagnosis.

“First, my version of God probably is not the traditional version of God. I think that the creative energy or force that everything evolved from, living and non-living, whatever's in this universe, I choose to call it love. Christians call it God, as one would call it. Others call it Mother Earth. Others call it this, and others call it that. Others call it the Sun God, but the name ultimately boils down to the creative energy that everything started from. So since I was born and raised a Christian, I go ahead and call it God, but basically I call it love. To me, I have it on the tombstone for my husband and me, and it reads: ‘Love lives forever.’ I think love is forever. And so when I feel alone, that's my starting point. Sometimes it's more successful than others, but...”

In a nutshell, here is how Nedra Kinerk defines her existence, both in the present and the future, and if it helps anyone else deal with life’s heavy blows, so much the better, she says: “I believe that I am going to exist forever because I am my soul, and my soul is a piece of God. And God is everything. Whatever was, is, or will be is God.”

If you tell Nedra that you’re “sorry,” for what she is going through, she doesn’t want to hear it, even though she says it in a nice way.

“No, don’t say you’re sorry. Say, it’s been a blessing to know you, think of me in kind ways, and even though I’ve been given six months or less to live, that doesn’t mean I won’t live longer.”

Always the eternal optimist. Part of who Nedra is.

With a final thought, she says: “There are a lot of people who haven’t lived as long as I have, so I have no complaints, only thanks and gratitude for the life that I have lived. And so much love for the many family and friends who have helped keep me company along the way with so many years full of love, happiness, and joy.”