Obituary of ROSEMARIE JUZKIW

ROSEMARIE JUZKIW (NEE MCLAY)

February 21, 1942 – April 5, 2018

RoseMarie died unexpectedly on April 5, 2018 as the result of a sudden illness. She will be deeply missed by her husband Dan, her daughter Nike, son-in-law Elliott Brown and his family, and by her many friends. She had recently celebrated a very special 76^th birthday.

The only child of John and Marie McLay (nee Copithorn), RoseMarie was born in Regina, Saskatchewan. She grew up in Moose Jaw and, later, in the Silver Heights neighbourhood of St. James when her father’s work with the Canadian Pacific Railway took the family to Manitoba. It was there in 1958, on a blind double-date as a favour to a friend, that she met a broody-looking North End lad in a black denim jacket, Dan Juzkiw. Always a proponent of equality, RoseMarie asked Dan to the Sadie Hawkins dance two weeks later, the start of an unconventional 18 year courtship.

RoseMarie finished high school and secretarial training before embarking on a varied professional career with Air Canada and as a legal secretary, first in Winnipeg and later in Vancouver. During these years, she had the opportunity to travel extensively, and often reminisced about her solo trips to the British Isles and Hawaii.

Dan and RoseMarie remained in touch throughout this time, and they were married in Vancouver in February 1976 – much to the surprise of their parents. In the late 1970s, RoseMarie joined Dan on his extended work trips launching Black Brant sounding rockets for Bristol Aerospace from White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico and Kiruna, Sweden. She could claim to have seen more rocket launches than many of the NASA crew, and was always the one on her feet when the “steely-eyed rocket men” crawled back to El Paso from the “Lagoa Blanca” in Juarez.

After their marriage, RoseMarie and Dan settled in Winnipeg and then St. Andrews, Manitoba, where they were joined by daughter Nike in 1981. RoseMarie loved her small family and her extended “family by choice” fiercely. She stayed home to raise her daughter, and to care first for her mother and father, and later for Dan’s parents, through their illnesses in the 1980s and 1990s. It was during those years that the Juzkiw family found its second home and lifelong friends in Grand Forks, North Dakota.

In recent years, RoseMarie was a regular attendee with Dan at Bristol retiree events. RoseMarie also had a love of theatre, music, and the arts, including family outings to the Manitoba Theatre Centre and many concerts with Nike – especially Paul Anka, Cher, and RoseMarie’s all-time favourite Neil Diamond. She was always proud of her Irish, English, and Scottish heritage, always cheered for the Saskatchewan Roughriders, and was always happiest in the kitchen, without a recipe. Always a lady, RoseMarie was sustained through the ups and downs of her life by her strong sense of fairness and principle, her quiet faith and spirituality, and, above all, the respect and genuine interest she had for people wherever she met them.

The family is deeply grateful to the paramedics and emergency team at Selkirk Regional Health Centre, and the Emergency and Medical Intensive Care team at Health Sciences Centre, especially Aly, all of whom treated RoseMarie with dignity and compassion in her last hours.

A funeral service will be held at Little Britain United Church, 5879 Provincial Trunk Highway 9, Lockport, Manitoba, on Saturday, May 12, 2018, at 1:00pm. In lieu of flowers, friends may wish to consider a donation to Siloam Mission or another charity in RoseMarie’s memory.

“Cracklin’ Rosie, get on board / we’re gonna ride ‘til there ain’t no more to go”