Inez T. Duren

Inez Tidwell Duren of Decatur, Georgia passed away on March 14, 2023 while in hospice care. She was preceded in death by her parents; Vegie and Thelma Tidwell, and her siblings; Edna Mann, Hyman Tidwell and Jimmy Tidwell. Also preceding her in death was the love of her life, Thomas E. Duren. She is survived by her children; Steven Mullins (Amelia Brown), David Mullins (Stacie Mullins) and Dawn Seyler (Richard Seyler), her five grandchildren; Christopher Duren, Andrew Mullins, Mary Kate Mullins, Alva Seyler, and Emmaline Seyler. and her two great-grandchildren; Jaxon Duren and Dash Duren.

Inez was born on July 23, 1938 and grew up in the small farming community of Siam just outside the city of Elizabethton in the mountains of Northeast Tennessee. She carried the values of hard work, thrift, and self-sufficiency that she learned on the farm with her the rest of her life and passed those values on to her children. She got her first job as a roller skating carhop at the Dixie Maid Drive-in restaurant when she was thirteen. When she was fourteen, she had the first of her many travels alone as a teenager when she went to Akron, Ohio to visit her uncle and aunt and to see the Soapbox Derby Championship. Inez was proud of her travels as a teenager. She quit school after ninth grade so that she could attend cosmetology school in Johnson City during the day and continue to work as a carhop at night to pay for school. After graduating cosmetology school, she married and moved to Germany at the age of sixteen, traveling alone all the way to New York City via train and then to Bremerhaven, Germany by steamship. When her husband was transferred to the US territory of Alaska in 1958, she flew to Seattle alone with her first born and boarded a ship bound for Whittier, Alaska, her home for the next eighteen months. The economic demands of two more children by the time she was twenty-two slowed down her travels for a few years, but she was always willing to hop in the car for a road trip to Florida, especially if there was a dog track or casino to visit. It was during her travels that she developed the stubborn streak of independence that can be found in all of her progeny.

With her eyes opened by her travels, in 1962 Inez took the family to Atlanta where there were more opportunities for the entire family. Within a month of arriving, she had a job as a hairstylist. After a year and a half of building her clientele, she took over as manager of a shop in Oak Grove. It turns out that Inez had a wonderful mind for business. She studied what the owner of the shop did, both right and wrong, and spent the next two years building her clientele and learning the financial end. By mid-1967, she opened her own shop, Styles by Inez, in Decatur. Not bad for someone with a ninth grade education!

Inez loved sports and athletics. As a child, she loved to climb trees and hide from her brothers. She also loved softball and basketball, a sport in which she excelled. She was the captain of her middle school team and liked to brag that she scored 38 of the 39 points that her team scored in a district championship (sadly, a losing effort). As an adult she was an avid bowler in a mixed-doubles league. She also poured herself into the sports that her children played. She went from being a (overly) supportive fan in the stands at almost every game (sometimes our games were at the same time so she would stand in the outfield between the fields so that she could run back and forth and see both), to a team mother and parent volunteer in the concession stand, to an officer of the youth association and never complained about having to balance work, school and extracurriculars for herself and three children. She finally got some help when she met the love of her life, Thomas Duren, who took on the double challenge of a younger wife with three children. They were married when she was thirty-two. Together, they strengthened our family unit both emotionally and financially and moved us into the middle class with the purchase of our first home in 1972.

The friendships that Inez developed throughout her life supported and sustained her when things got tough, as they invariably do. They helped her through the trauma of her first pregnancy that ended up stillborn, her divorce from her first husband, and the death of her second husband after her forty-first birthday. One of her favorite sayings was “friends are the family you choose”. You knew you were truly her friend when she invited you to go fishing, watch a sporting event, come by the pool, play cards, or go to the casino.

The arrival of grandchildren and great-grandchildren opened a new chapter in her life. They became the center of her existence for whom she would do anything. She reveled in their successes and made a production of even the smallest accomplishment because she wanted them to understand how special they were. Most importantly, she got her new name, Meme, a name we all proudly and lovingly remember her as, now and forever.

Inez’s children and grandchildren will welcome family and friends on April 15 from 1-3 PM at Eternal Hills Funeral Home located at 3594 Stone Mountain Hwy, Snellville, Ga 30039. The funeral will follow immediately at the Eternal Hills Memory Gardens next door.

Fond memories and expressions of sympathy may be shared at www.eternalhillsfuneralhome.com for the Duren family.