Elena T. Lebedev, 63, of Natick, Massachusetts, passed away at her home on May 9, 2026. She was a woman of rare brilliance, fierce loyalty, and boundless generosity of spirit, wisdom, and wit—a person who could walk into a room and make everyone in it feel more alive.

Elena was born in Dnipro, Ukraine. She was not a person who accepted boundaries. At four, she negotiated with her mother—a professor of languages—to stay home from school to read her mother's library. She attended the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology at seventeen, exempted from entrance examinations, and graduated summa cum laude with a degree in engineering and physics. Her dissertation was on the behavior of high-speed gas particles. Elena was, in the most precise sense of the term, a rocket scientist—though she was far too humble to say so.

When the Soviet Union collapsed, Elena emigrated to America, arriving in Brookline, Massachusetts, with a physics degree and a new culture to learn. She took a job at Filene's Basement sorting clothes. She did not complain. She built. Elena developed her programming skills, bought a house entirely on her own, and built a career as a photographer and web designer, finding success on her own terms.

It was here that her beloved son, Peter, was born. Elena was entirely devoted to him—her malchik. Whatever else life brought, Peter was at the center of her universe, and that never changed. Elena passed at her home in Natick, in the community she had chosen, surrounded by the life she had built from nothing, twice.

Elena is survived by her coniunx animis, Frederick Peralta; her beloved son, Peter Paul Lebedev; his father, Valeriy Lebedev; his daughter Eugenia Clifford and her son Leo Clifford; her sisters, Nina Nikolayevskaya and Olha Nikolayevskaya; her nephew Leonid Shevtsov, his wife Lesya Shevtsova, and their son Timofey Shevtsov; her niece Nadiia Kurazh, her husband Olexander Kurazh, and their children Polina and Sofia Kurazh; and her dear friends, Svetlana Plokhaya and Tania Klein.

She was preceded in death by her parents, Leonid Nikolayevsky and Tamara Nikolayevskaya, and her dear friend, Vladimir Fyodorov.

May her memory be eternal, and may her soul find everlasting peace.

Visiting Hours in the John Everett & Sons Funeral Home 4 Park Street Natick Common on Saturday May 30th from 10am-12pm.  Followed by Orthodox Service at 12pm.  Interment will follow at Glenwood Cemetery, South Natick.

Elena fought cancer with the same intensity she brought to everything — her physics, her family, her life. At first diagnosed the breast cancer was stage four...

Elena had invasive lobular carcinoma — the second most common form of breast cancer, yet one that remains dangerously underfunded and poorly understood. Unlike other breast cancers, ILC often forms no lump, making it harder to detect through screening and self-exams. Elena diligently cared for herself and had regular breast exams that failed for years to detect the cancer growth, likely because there was no pain.

Elena deserved better diagnostics, better tools, better treatments, and more answers than medicine currently has.

In her memory, please consider a donation to the Lobular Breast Cancer Alliance (LBCA) — the only organization in the U.S. dedicated to ILC research and patient advocacy. They fund critical research, support clinical trials, and fight for the attention this disease has been denied for too long.

Donate at: 

Lobular Breast Cancer Alliance 

lobularbreastcanceralliance-bloom.kindful.com

or 

Dana-Farber Cancer Institute 

https://www.dana-farber.org/how-you-can-help/ways-to-give 

Elena would not have asked for flowers.

She would have asked for progress.

For directions and guest book please visit www.everettfuneral.com

 

Eulogy for Elena T. Lebedev

Delivered by Frederick (Rick) Peralta

Hello. I am Rick — or Krolick, as Elena would say — her friend and partner for more than eighteen years.

Elena’s name means “bright, shining light,” and she lived every day as the personification of that brilliance. She was a woman of rare diligence and quiet passion — a person who began her intellectual journey at four years old by successfully negotiating to stay home and read her mother’s library rather than attend pre-school. Her mother was a professor of languages. She read what was there. That was sufficient.

By twelve, that same resolve had fixed her sights on one of the world’s premier technical institutes. Right after her seventeenth birthday, Elena arrived at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology. She did not sit for the entrance examinations. She sat for one test. A professor took her answer book, looked at it, handed it back, and said: more. She asked if it was incorrect. He said: more. He then claimed her as his student and exempted her from the rest of the testing process. She graduated summa cum laude with degrees in engineering and physics. Her dissertation was on the behavior of high-speed gas particles.

To put it simply: Elena was a rocket scientist — though she was far too humble to say so.

Elena always had resolve — at twelve mapping her academic career, at sixteen pushing for acceptance to her chosen school, and for the rest of her life. She rebelled against high-handedness wherever she found it. As a young woman she did not just study history — she stood in the middle of it. When the crowds gathered in protest and the heavy vehicles came, Elena did not hesitate. She stood her ground, resolute and unyielding, choosing to remain true to her convictions even when faced with the literal weight of opposition. That was simply who she was.

Elena’s son Peter was the center of her universe. She spoke to him daily and saw him weekly. Peter was born with special needs, and Elena rose to the challenge of being his mother with the same resolve she brought to everything else in her life.

Elena always wanted to help — but she understood that helping often meant stepping back, watching carefully, and only putting her hand in when it was truly needed. She was a master of that discipline, and nowhere was it more evident than in the world she built around Peter.

Peter’s support team came from all walks of life. Many could barely speak English. Many carried the weight of difficult backgrounds. Elena met every one of them with the same dignity and kindness — without exception, without condescension. When something went wrong, as it sometimes does, she created a space where staff felt safe to be open and honest. And then she would let it go. No drama. No complaint. And when an issue needed to be addressed, it was approached with a clear focus on a positive outcome.

The people around Peter knew what she had built. Elena received their gratitude, their admiration, and in time their awards — recognized formally as an exemplary parent. She accepted that quietly, the way she accepted most things that confirmed what she already knew was right.

Elena orchestrated a grand new chapter for her mother, Tamara. For a professor of languages who had spent a lifetime in a society that strictly excluded the outside world, Elena turned the United States into a marvelous adventure. Tamara flourished in this second home, eventually summing up her gratitude with the words: Chuzhbina, Chuzhbina, you are so good to me — foreign land, you are so good to me. Elena made foreign lands feel like home — for everyone who found their way into her orbit.

Elena believed in the art of living well — prioritizing health, humor, and the joy of fine yarn. She could knit a pair of socks in a single day, ensuring the striped yarn matched with mathematical precision from left to right.

Elena’s precision was entirely her own. As a child, she could be called upon to know the number of windows in the room. Her car was spotless. Her socks matched to the millimeter. She presented herself neatly, with care. Yet the towels were lost in the basement and her hair often had its own ideas.

Elena knew exactly where her attention belonged. Everything else could wait. And Elena trusted that the people who truly knew her would respect her wishes.

Elena was a woman of precise definitions, yet she chose one word to encompass everything she loved: Bunny.

There were variations, of course.

Her son Peter — her Malchik — was her primary Krolick.

I was her second Krolick.

And eventually, there was the car. A robotic Tesla. Once she passed the shock of owning such an incredible piece of technology, she fell in love with it completely. It became the third Bunny of her life.

The car also provided the perfect vantage point for her darkly sharp humor. Elena did not suffer fools, especially on the road. She would watch a reckless driver or a distracted pedestrian and remark with ice-cold certainty: They would not survive in Moscow.

To Elena, the world required civility. She had little patience for those who lacked it — and she had a gift for the precise phrase that could dismantle an argument, open a conversation, or stop a room. She used that gift without apology.

When the time came to find a place to gather after the service, the obvious choice was already booked. None of the other options felt right. Then an unlikely option came up — Lookout Farm, just down the road from where she will rest. Walking the grounds, there were happy memories everywhere. It was immediately clear she would approve.

Elena asked that glacier glasses be placed with her at her funeral. When asked why, she said: for what is to come.

That was Elena. Prepared. Precise. Ready for whatever brightness lay ahead — and not the least bit afraid of it.

Elena was, above all, a bright light. Not a soft or decorative light — a precise, directed, brilliant light that illuminated exactly what needed to be seen. She was our friend, our knitter, our protector, and our rocket scientist.

She leaves us with a legacy of sharp wit, deep sacrifice, and a reminder to always look for the bright in the world.

She was the bright in mine.

— Krolick