She was predeceased by her husband, Joseph Kenneth Elliott Webster, parents Willy and Valina (Bourne) Proverbs, brother Jack Proverbs, sisters Mary (Eddie) Edghill, and Gladys (Tony) Lewis, her aunt Lottie Bourne, and nieces Elizabeth Lewis and Katherine Edghill.
She is survived by her daughter Mary (William) Johnson, step-daughters Jo Anne (Steve) Goodman and Jill (Allan) Otway, and her brother Herbert (Audrey) Proverbs, and sister Ruth (Eric) Johnson. She also leaves behind step-grandchildren Elizabeth, Gina, Wayne, Sharon and Kristina, nine step-great-grandchildren and two step-great- great-grandchildren, as well as many nephews and nieces.
Marjorie, known to many as Marj, was born on December 18th, 1925, in the Caribbean island of Barbados in the West Indies. She was the eldest of six children born to William Laurie Proverbs and Orietta Valina (Bourne) Proverbs of Grassfield, St. Philip. Her siblings were Herbert, Jack, Mary, Gladys, and Ruth. They did not have lot materially, but theirs was a happy home, filled with love. They led a simple but good life in the country, the children being taught to be thankful for what they had. Toys were scarce so they made their own creative play, such as sailing homemade boats in small rivulets after a heavy rain. They used old tin cans to bake mud pies in the sun, and conch shells became cows to be led around the yard with string! The backyard was alive with chickens, rabbits, ducks, pigs, and sheep. There was also a donkey called Prince, who pulled the family donkey cart, and he would come to the back door to beg for crackers. Of course, there were always cats and dogs around, as well as a few unwanted creatures, such as big centipedes that thrived in the old dirt-floor buttery, which was turned into a bedroom as the family grew. The old house was full of character and bursting at the seams as each new baby entered the world. As the oldest child, Marjorie remembered waiting in a huddle at the bottom of the stairs, eager to know if they had another brother or a sister.
It was a full house of ten in the early days, as her maternal grandmother Mahetabelle Caroline Bourne lived with them, as well as her mother's older sister, Lottie Bourne, fondly known to all as Aunt Lot. In fact, she came to be like a second mother to all the children, helping to look after them, while Valina cooked up a storm to feed all the hungry mouths, and Willy bicycled to work every day at Foursquare sugar factory. Some of their happiest times were spent with Aunt Lot walking to nearby Beachy Head to swim in the sea. They would come home with their swimsuits loaded down with heavy, wet sand from playing in the surf! One day at Long Bay (near Sam Lord's Castle) Marjorie, Gladys and Ruth got caught in a strong current and nearly drowned!
Thankfully, other friends were there to pull them back to shore. This early experience probably accounted for their healthy respect for the ocean. A common remark was "Be careful child! The sea has no back door!"
Along with the happy days there were times of sorrow too as brother Jack passed away at the young age of 14, and sister Mary at the age of 33. Marjorie also lost her beloved father when he was still a relatively young man, after which her mother came to live with her, as by then she was married with her own family. In the years to come she would also lose Aunt Lot, and in due course, her dear mother Valina also passed on, although not until she reached the ripe old age of 95 years. Hard work obviously agreed with her!
After leaving school and taking secretarial training, Marj went to work in the capital, Bridgetown, where she often boarded during the week, going home on weekends. Travel was clearly more difficult back then, even on such a small island of just 166 square miles! A horse and buggy was an early means of transport, until they finally acquired a car. Hence, the family spent much of their time together and were close-knit. To Marj, family was everything.
In time Marjorie left home and had a family of her own. She came to know and fell in love with her future husband, Kenneth Webster. He was one of ten children, so she became part of another larger family. They were married on October 22nd, 1955 and lived at Wildey Plantation in St. Michael. Sadly, Kenneth's first wife Annie (Reader) had passed away some years before, but now began a new chapter in both their lives.
Marjorie inherited two wonderful step-daughters, Jo Anne and Jill, who were already into their teenage years. Naturally this wasn't easy for either party as they navigated the challenges of a blended family, but Marj grew to love them very much, and later on their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren as well. On September 30th, 1956 Marjorie and Kenneth were blessed with another daughter and they named her Mary Louise Valina. Marj had a great capacity to love and it was poured into this child, whom she adored. She was very protective of her, perhaps a little too much so, but this was how she showed her love.
The years at Wildey passed happily, amidst the normal ups and downs of life. A few weeks in the summertime were often spent at a seaside house enjoying the sea and sand. It was a child's paradise, as was the wide open space to explore on the plantation. Far too soon, though, it all came to an end when Kenneth lost a long battle with tuberculosis and died on July 17th, 1968. He was only 54 years old. Losing him hit the whole family very hard. Jo Anne and Jill had already married and moved out, and
then the plantation was to be sold, so Marjorie, along with her 11-year-old daughter and her mother, had to look for a new home. It was at this time that her brother Herbert and his wife Audrey took them in for a period of time until they could move into their own place. Marj went on to raise Mary as a single mother, but thankfully she had the loving support of family and friends, and her mother also lived with them and was a pillar of support. She went back out to work, first as a school teacher, and then as a secretary at a jewelry store called Y. De Lima in Bridgetown, where she worked for 15 years before retiring.
After her daughter Mary got married to William Johnson in December 1980 and then immigrated to Canada a few months later, Marj sold her house and downsized to a small studio apartment, and later to a 2-bedroom basement suite. She missed her daughter immensely, and being such a family-oriented person, she found it hard living alone. In December 1986 she immigrated to Canada herself to be nearer to her daughter and son-in-law. She did live in an apartment on her own for a few years, but then moved in with them, not an ideal arrangement in a small house with only one bathroom, but they made it work! She tried to help in whatever way she could, including babysitting their two large dogs whenever Mary and Will went camping.
So, here she was settled in North Vancouver, having left her homeland behind, but loving her new country. She was grateful to be accepted into this lovely part of the world, with all its advantages and what was a higher standard of living than she'd ever known. She appreciated its natural beauty, quite different to the tropical climate where she grew up. When it snowed she would often stand at the window, enthralled with the tiny flakes that fell and covered everything in a blanket of white. Of course, she missed her family and friends back home, but she adapted quite well and made the best life she could for herself in Canada. She missed many things from her life in Barbados, including fruit like mangoes, guavas, dunks, ackees, tamarinds, soursop, and sugar apples, as well as other local foods like flying fish, cou cou, pudding and souse, roti, breadfruit, eddoes, and cassava. Of course, she quickly came to appreciate the many new things that Canada had to offer.
Marjorie was always a contented sort of person, and felt a deep gratitude for her many blessings. She never liked to draw attention to herself, and was happy to remain in the background, preferring to live a quiet life with the ones she loved. In keeping with this unassuming attitude she did not want any fuss to be made upon her death. As per her wishes, no funeral service will be held. The purpose of this memorial tribute is to celebrate her life and honour her legacy. It offers a small window into the kind of person she was and what she meant to those who loved her.
It's been said that when you're gone what matters is not what you got in life but what you gave, and Marj certainly gave of herself, with her loving nature, and her total devotion to her family. She was not an overly talkative person but was always ready with a listening ear and compassionate word to anyone who needed it. It's also been said that what matters is not your competence but your character, and she was a lovely person, humble and respectful of others, always a kind and gentle soul. She was generous of spirit, never speaking ill of anyone, and also generous in a material sense. She delighted in giving someone some small item of her own, not for any particular reason, but just to show she cared! There was an almost childlike innocence about her that was refreshing.
Marj was generally a private and serious-minded woman but she had a great sense of humour. She enjoyed a good joke or a comedy, and her hugely infectious laugh was guaranteed to make others laugh too, even if they didn't know what she was laughing at! One of her best qualities was being able to have a good laugh at herself, like when her daughter had the ill-conceived idea to try teaching her to drive and she nearly drove into a dunk tree! Or the time when she fell in the supermarket but somehow managed to hold up the carton of eggs she was carrying so not a single one broke! After another fateful trip to the supermarket she was bending over to retrieve the bags of groceries from the trunk of the car when she heard her brother-in-law Lisle and his wife Phyllis whooping with laughter and discovered that the back seam of her pants had ripped apart! Of course, the more disturbing thought was, were the pants torn open when she was walking around in the store?!!! No one knows for sure!
Few people knew that Marjorie struggled with an anxiety disorder, which affected many aspects of her life, but she did her best with the hand she was dealt. It was commendable how she met the challenges she faced. She lived a long and healthy life and will be remembered for her loving spirit, and undemanding manner. It was obvious how much she cared about people when the mere thought of the homeless trying to survive a cold winter was enough to bring her to the verge of tears. She loved animals too and had many pets through the years, feeling the loss when they died. She enjoyed the simple things in life, like a good book, and instilled a love of reading into her daughter, by happily reading to her from when she was very young. (It's debatable which of them enjoyed the stories more!) She also liked doing crosswords, and to this day it brings her family amusement when they remember her exclamation of "It fits, so it must be right!" Gardens were another of her interests, although she preferred admiring them to tending them! In the Fall she would pick up pretty leaves and press them as a memento. The novelty of a red or orange leaf falling from a tree intrigued her.
Something else she liked was feathers and she had quite the collection. Her daughter and son-in-law were instructed to save any that they happened to find in the garden!
The later years of Marjorie's life were complicated by the onset of dementia. Sadly, this sweet, intelligent woman who would hug her daughter each night and tell her "You're my treasure!" was eventually unable to even recognize her. The last two years were spent in the Lynn Valley Care Centre, and sincere thanks go out to the wonderful nurses, care aides, and other staff members who looked after her so well. Her family will be eternally grateful for the loving care she received, and they will never forget the kindness they were shown in those final days after she had a stroke and then passed away three days later. Her daughter and son-in-law were allowed to stay with her day and night until her last breath, and it brought them a measure of comfort to know that she was never alone. Also very much appreciated was the expert care from Dr. Barbara Hejdankova, who was very kind to Marj over the years, once describing her as a lovely lady. At this time the family would like to express their thanks to all those who have offered condolences or helped in other ways. Mere words cannot properly convey how much it's appreciated.
Marj was raised with a strong belief in God, and she tried to live her life accordingly. In the mid-70's further study of the Bible deepened her appreciation for the role of Jesus Christ as our Saviour and King of God's Kingdom, which he taught us to pray for in the Lord's Prayer. She was happy to learn how this Kingdom would accomplish God's purpose for all creation and how we fit into that purpose here on the earth. She had the courage to take a stand for her newfound faith as one of Jehovah's Witnesses, and she did her best to share that faith with others. It remained dear to her heart until advanced dementia stole her memory and thinking ability. She is now in God's memory awaiting a resurrection to life on a paradise earth, as He originally intended for mankind.
Marjorie's love of family was deep, and leaving them was the hardest part of her move to Canada. She was appreciative of all they did for her, especially to her brother Herbert for accompanying her to Vancouver in September 1981 when her daughter was severely injured and lost her left leg in a motorcycle accident. She always said the shock of that tragic event almost killed her, and she was so grateful for Herbert's support. (For some reason, she was always very fond of him, even though she said that as a boy he would catch lizards and scare her with them!!!)
In Marjorie's mind her family and their old house called Grassfield were inextricably linked. Even dementia could not erase the memory of her beloved childhood home because at the end of her life she imagined that she was back there again, which in a way was a comfort. She always remembered with great fondness the place she was born and raised, as evidenced by the following heartfelt poem she wrote in 2004 when she was 78 years old. She never forgot where she came from and the ones with whom she spent her formative years. Her family in turn will always cherish her memory and she will live on in their hearts.
I Remember
I can still hear the wind
in the mahogany trees
and see the branches swaying.
From upstairs I could see
the fishing boats
as they came back to shore
with their cargo of fish
for everyone.
Our house was very old
but it withstood earthquakes
and many hurricanes.
Those were happy days
where love oozed out the walls.
This is how I will always remember
"Grassfield".
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