Barbs talk at the Memorial Service

We are now here. Finally. Very final.. Standing at the memorial service for our dear mother, Georges wife,. For some a bonus mother, others a sister and sister / mother in law  to some, grandmother and greatgrandmother to some. To many  a very good friend,  to some a colleague, others an acquaintance. To many  a project and community worker.


She was a person that influenced many people in their meeting with her.  I want to express our deep gratitude to you for coming here today and sharing this memorial service with us, and to say goodbye.

One of Mums comments during her short illness ws “What a wonderful gift this last phase of my life has been”. During this time she received cards and emails, from many of you, and I will here weave a few of these words into an “oral quilt”.
She had a fine eye for beauty, she saw the world with the delight and wonder of a child. she thrived on creative projects. She was a magnificent planner, so much that we sometimes got tired just thinking of her planning desires.

She was a woman with empathy, wisdom, kindness and had an overflowing generous spirit, and had an ability to make and keep wonderful friends, wherever she was.  This gave her a network of people all over the world.

She was fiercely intelligent, not easy to hide anything from.  A week before her death, she caught little brother Mike in cheating in wizard.

She loved and was loved by many people. In her last months she basked in this love, and she talked about her life as being a life of making love, thinking that this has become such a limited word in our world, usually having sexual assosiations. But mum said, there is so much love without it being sexual, and so much sex with never making love. She saw her life as making love.

We will miss her, with sorrow and with love. We will also take her  with us, and ask ourselves, “what would Mum /Yetta  say about that?”

A Gabriola woman wrote “Good memories are so important, we need to keep them and embroider them with some forgetmenots to remember, roses for sweetness, fireweed for toughness and a few brambles to keep us alert”.

Thank you for contributions to this email quilt.  We have made a site for a virtual quilt and memories – www.rememberingyetta.com

Thank you, for all that you gave Mum in her life, some / a lot of which she has shared with us and passed on to so many people.

Though her body is gone, our relationships with her and each other will continue. Thank you.