Her late parents were Raymond and Dolores Olmsted. She was preceded in passing by her husband David and her two sons Bryan and Sean, she is survived by six children Rocky, Doug, Scott, Erin, Cheryl and Mary, as well as by eleven grandchildren, ten great grand children, her sister Laverne and scores of nieces and nephews. She had many careers over her colorful life but was best known for being a deli manager for over 20 years. Her speciality was teaching people how to cut the cheese.
On Tuesday August 27, 2019 Annette Diane Rowan, beloved mother, wife, grandmother, and sister passed away after a brave and heart breaking fight against an insidious illness at the age 77 in Katy TX surrounded by her family.
She had a passion for dance, once gracing the stage of the famed American Bandstand. She loved music, the King of Rock ‘n Roll Elvis Presley was her first love, but Andrea Bocelli sang the songs that moved her soul.
She loved to love people. She gave of herself everything she could, and then she gave more. She was not perfect by any means, but just as the sly smile and quixotic gaze of that most enigmatic portrait by Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci, it made her even more beautiful of a person. To compare my mother to one of the most iconic artworks in history is unfair, to that artwork. As a living, breathing person who gave birth to eight children, 6 lived to adulthood while 2 were taken to heaven in infancy. She suffered through hardship and doubt, a marriage rocky at times, she persevered until the untimely death of her spouse. Then a hard road became harder raising three willful girls as a single mom. She succeeded again, those girls became inspirational women and mothers in their own right. They carried on her tradition of telling life’s problems to stick it where the sun don’t shine. She pushed on through an illness and subsequent surgeries and hospitalization that spanned two years. Demoralizing and degrading, her day to day life became seemingly unbearable. I mention these bad times because of the way she existed with grace and selflessness through them. She knew how to complain and did it well about all manner of things, but never about her situation and didn’t know how to feel sorry for herself. Until the very end she was more concerned with her caretakers than herself. All of these things don’t amount to an unfair comparison to Mona, just one thing does, her laugh. When echoed in stereo by her beloved sister, traveling companion and best friend it was true magic. It is as simple as that. Life in mom’s eyes was simple, love your family unconditionally, period. Seems simple, but look around at your family and you will soon realize simple is the last thing family is.
She loved to travel and reveled in all her time abroad, savoring it like a fine wine remembering the nuance and complexity of the flavor, and regretting the hangover of directions gone awry, missed destinations and all the unforeseen hiccups in well laid travel plans.
She will be forever missed and loved until the end of time by every soul she touched.
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