Mrs. Miriam Speers

Obituary

My mom was the kindest person imaginable. She loved fiercely and protectively and occasionally, unreasonably. For the last few years, she was always there for her grandson Judah and her son Jordan, and for me. Her father Abrahão was her hero (and mine) and he instilled a “help others ethic” into both of us that, at times, did not help the helpers, but made her always “walk good” as my reggae friends would say. My mom walked good, wherever she went, and even though she was a girl from Botafogo, as her beloved friend here Polly said, she walked like the Girl from Ipanema and ‘everybody she passed “went ahhh.”’ And she sure went to a lot of places and touched a lot of people.

My mom was loyal, good and true. I have tried to be like her my whole life, and maybe one day I will catch up.

Born in Rio de Janeiro to my Vovô Abrahão and my Vovò Lillian, my mom and her brother Guilherme Brafman were carted off to London when she was 5 years old. My grandparents finished their studies (they were both the Drs. Brafman when my grandmother got her PhD in her 70s), and my uncle and confidante for the first few years of my life Ricardo Brafman was born a few years later.

My mom lived the life of a beautiful, headstrong North London teenager and met my father, Ed, whilst enjoying parties with members of my favourite British bands from the 60s and 70s. She forged lifelong friendships with people like my Godmother Joy Tweddle and her bestie Judith Kelleyan. Those friendships eventually morphed into beautiful blessings of intergenerational friendships for me. Much love to the second and third generations as well as the originals!

My young and independent parents moved to Brazil, where they were part of my family there, and oh, how did my mom love her Brazilian family. Her great-aunt Salomea and her cousins Leo and Lia and Marisa, and her friends like Noreen were people to whom my mother stayed connected right up until last week. Then my mom and dad made me; they ditched both their VW hippymobiles (sorry Dad), and my mom’s job as an English teacher and came up here to Canada and where my paternal grandparents had come from Europe via Israel and my mom started building her third life and career. It turns out that she hated the cold up here the same way she hated conscription and corruption down south, but she could always put on another sweater and have yet another cup of tea. And talk on the phone to Simmie Elizabeth Frieberg Antflick or Corrie Broderick in those days.

The ESL school that my dad and mom started was evidence of both that Vovô Abrahǎo help ethic and my mother’s lifelong love of words and language. It started off as the space over Pizza Gigi (still the best pizza in the neighbourhood), and grew to three physical locations. We would still go to England, at least once a year and often more, and I remember how excited my mother was when Guilherme and my first and best beloved Aunt Jane had my cousins Ben Xav and Charlie Brafman. My parents split up but family meant everything to her, so I spent more time with Ben and Charlie as children in the summers and school breaks than I did my own friends.

My mom met Barry Speers and married him when I was in sixth grade. Even some of my friends came to their wedding, because so many people travelled from all over the globe to be there for them. Her then-secretary and lifelong friend Maria and I got tasked with new items and dilemmas daily. My Godmother Corrie came from Vancouver and my dearly departed Uncle Otto (whose mother Marisa came from Italy for it) were the best bartenders ever - I drank a lot of Guaraná that night. Ricky played something lovely he had composed for her specifically on the viola and many of her people from Brazil, England and here (by then Darrell Dorsk and Polly Miller and Carolyn Acker, were already her Canadian crew for life) mingled and danced with Barry’s Canadian and Quebecois family (his parents, his sisters Heather and Fay, their families andl what felt to me like a million cousins) and it was one hell of a party that went till sunrise and spilled out into the park next-door.

(That poor DJ did not have a laptop and brought a dozen crates bc what she wanted him to play ranged from Reggae to Bossa Nova to classic rock and R&B/soul to Québécois pop music for Lil and the Speers clan AND of course, the classical music that Barry and my Vovô insisted on - this was a very, very bizarre yet somehow fun playlist. That night was also my introduction to the still-enjoyed tradition of hanging with the cool people outside the main gathering place.)

My brother Jordan was born two years later. My mother and Barry had houses in Brazil and Florida, but settled in Florida, where people from all over the world came to visit us, and to take their children to Disney World. By the time I was in high school, my mom had her feet planted in four countries. But she came back here without missing a beat because she thought Jordan’s education was more important than her desire to be in a hot beautiful place.

I’m going to fast forward through the next couple of decades to say that this kind of sacrifice for her child (in those days, Jordan) is something that marked my mother as an exceptional human being. She did it again at the beginning of the pandemic when she gave up her retirement dreams of a villa in France to come back here and be here for Jordan and also so she could spend more time with my Judah.

My mother loved both those two boys with every fibre of her being. I figure part of my moral obligation to her -for the rest of my days- is to keep reminding them of that. Her friends from England had settled in the south of France, and my mom had quite the joyful, raucous community over there, with new friends like Joseph Hernandez Silva, John J, Jen and Barrie and she gave that up happily for them, and ultimately her healthcare.

My mom struggled for the last 25 years of her life with various yucky physical ailments, and managed to still be there for Jordan and Judah, and also for her friends and I. She was kind and funny and brave throughout. Her insight, fierce love and grace never faltered.

She taught me to smile through pain, laugh when the world threw curve balls and never stop loving and believing in the best of our people. We cried on each other’s shoulders when we lost my grandparents, and when my cases and own life didn’t go well, and she told me to channel my grandfather’s wisdom whenever I was in doubt. And we smoked a lot and drank a lot of tea, which may not have been healthy, per se, but as anyone who knew my mom would remember, was just a part of hanging out with her.

Thank you Mum, for loving me so much and for making me into the person I am. Thank you for believing that you would be reunited with your dad because that is my biggest comfort right now - you’re somewhere together giving me advice and holding my hand. I know you expected me to be articulate and that I would write something meaningful here and I still miss you too much to really do that.

I would ask all of the people who have read this far and feel like writing or sending something to go to the link here: https://www.cardinalfuneralhomes.com/obituaries/mrs-miriam-speers/ and please write something in her “guestbook” so that Jordan and Judah and I can feel the love. In lieu of flowers, if you want to donate something, in the next couple of weeks, Jordan and I will figure out an appropriate charity involving mental healthcare, which as many of you would know was my grandfather’s lifelong profession and is important to Jordan.

She didn’t want a funeral and instructed me specifically only to “do a thing” if I had to - not for her but for the living, and that by the time she was gone, that would be for us to feel better and not to spend money stupidly. She hated funerals, did not want any kind of casket inside with sad people milling about and - like her own mama - wanted to be cremated. There will thus be “a thing” here in the summer at a time that works for both her brothers if possible, and it would be great to know who would like to be informed of when that is. I will keep everybody who says they want to be in the know, in the know.

She is no longer suffering. Sleep peacefully Mum, and keep arguing with my Vovô and my Bubbe about what I should do in my head and shouting over each other bc it both helps and makes me laugh. I will keep loving you as hard as you loved me, and will keep taking care of Jordan and Judah and keep trying to make you proud. And as usual, you got the last word, now I have to believe in an afterlife because I really want another hug, please.

Visitation

Service

Cremation