Helen Mickelson, a devoted mother, companion and the longtime Island office mainstay for Lawrence-Lynch Corporation died unexpectedly early Sunday morning, Dec. 18, in the Cape Cod Hospital. She was 65.

A hard-working mother of two, Helen was a familiar Island face, in part because over the years she had worked in numerous medical and business offices where her attention to detail was well appreciated. For the past 10 years, she worked for contractor Lawrence-Lynch, which operates an asphalt plant in Oak Bluffs. “She was a force,” was how Lawrence Lynch described her.

One of a family of six, Helen was devoted to her large and extended family of sisters and brothers, nieces and nephews; her longtime companion Tim Donald, with whom she shared a home; their six-year-old Lab Maggie and her beloved Patriots football team.

A sheet metal worker and coppersmith, Tim said he would often have to leave the house and go to his adjacent shop when the Patriots were playing. “She’d be screaming so loud Maggie would come to the shop and she’d be shaking,” he said. Losses to the hated New York Giants were always devastating.

Helen was born Nov. 20, 1951 in Providence, R. I., to Gloria and Howard A. Mickelson.

As a young girl she often visited family members on the Vineyard, a connection that would prove enduring and bring her back to the Island as an adult to live.

She graduated from Pinkerton Academy high school in New Hampshire in 1969, and in 1970 she married David A. Enright Sr., a member of the Navy and later a private contractor whose job responsibilities took the young couple around northern New England.

In January 1971 the couple had a son, David. He was followed by a daughter, Amy, in September 1976. Following a divorce, Helen and her teenage daughter moved to Martha’s Vineyard where her mother, since divorced and happily remarried to Carl George, then lived. “Her heart was always on the Vineyard. She loved the Island,” Gloria said.

She went to work in the office of Island dentist Dr. Peter Strock. Several other office jobs followed. It was while waitressing at the Get a Life Cafe on Main Street in Vineyard Haven in 1994, now Mocha Mott’s, that she met Tim Donald.

Together they built a house on a small lot adjacent to his shop. “She really made our house a home,” Tim said. With a broad smile he added, “And she was always changing things around when I would go away.”

Helen loved to read, most often while sitting on the front porch. Her reading list was broad and extensive and ranged from beach fiction to history and the arts. “Everything. She read constantly,” Tim said.

The couple enjoyed spending time in Tim’s hunting cabin in Harmony, Me. Her domestic touch provided a welcome transformation to the simple cabin previously only shared by men.

When not reading, she would make clothes or do needlepoint art. Her son David recalled her talent in most any craft. “It seemed like forever that all of our clothes were homemade,” he said.

And there was his mother’s unvarnished, sometimes profane, sense of humor. “There were no filters with her sense of humor,” David said with a laugh.

Helen is survived by her mother Gloria and her husband of 52 years, Carl George of Marlboro; son David Enright, 45, of Oak Bluffs; daughter Amy Pendergast, 40, and her husband, Derek, of Covington, Ga.; longtime companion Tim Donald of Vineyard Haven; and siblings: Michael A. Mickelson of Derry, N.H.; Catherine McLean and her husband Arthur of Derry, N.H.; Marybeth Linscott and her husband Keith of Oak Bluffs; James A. Mickelson and his wife Tammy of Bedford, N.H.; Ruth Pendergast and her husband Dennis of Derry, N.H., and Thomas C. George and his wife Jacque of Winslow, Ariz., as well as many nieces and nephews. Her father Howard Mickelson predeceased her.

A visitation will be held on Tuesday, Dec. 27 from 5 to 7 p.m. at the Chapman, Cole and Gleason Funeral Home in Oak Bluffs. A memorial funeral mass will be held at 11 a.m., Wednesday, Dec. 28 at St. Augustine’s Church in Vineyard Haven, followed by interment of her cremains at the West Tisbury Cemetery.

A celebration of life will follow at the PA Club in Oak Bluffs at approximately 1 p.m. Please bring a dish to share.

In lieu of flowers, donations in Helen’s memory may be made to the Vineyard Haven Public Library, 200 Main Street, Vineyard Haven, MA 02568.