Mrs. Joyce Alice Cymbaluk

Obituary

Cymbaluk, Joyce Alice (nee Groombridge) died peacefully at home on Wednesday, November 3, 2021, in the 91st year of her life. Joyce was born April 2nd 1930 in London England, to Sidney and Florence Groombridge. Joyce was predeceased by her parents, brother Sidney and husband Lawrence. She leaves behind her two daughters Maria with her husband Peter, Sonia and her husband John, her beloved grandchildren Mark and Christine, and her nieces and nephews.

During the war Joyce’s family moved to Nottingham where at the tender age of 14 she went to work full time at the Player’s tobacco factory with her father. It was also in Nottingham that at 18 she met Lawrence, the one true romantic love of her life, as she was sitting on a park bench. It seems odd that a passing Ukrainian prisoner of war would win her heart by simply offering her a candy with a noble gentlemanly gesture. But the chemistry between them must have been electric, as she did not speak Ukrainian - he spoke very little English, but on that very day she mentioned to her girlfriend that, “she would marry that man one day”.

And that’s exactly what happened. At 22 the couple did marry and in 1952 she gave birth to their first daughter Maria. The three of them lived in England until 1956 when they decided to move their young family to Canada for better opportunities. In Canada they settled in Toronto and it was Joyce in fact that landed the family’s first job with the Zurich Insurance Company where she worked for many years. Lawrence soon followed with a job of his own and like all newcomers to the country they both worked very hard and saved what they could to purchase their own home in Bloor West Village in the early 1960s. In 1966 their second daughter Sonia was born and the family flourished in a caring, loving home.

In 2002 Joyce suffered a devastating loss when her husband of 50 years passed away from lung cancer and she lived on her own until 2010 when due to declining health she decided to sell her home and move in with her daughter Sonia and her family. It was here that her grandchildren Mark and Christine benefited from her love and care and she was affectionately nicknamed, “Baba Joyce”. She doted on her grandchildren spending many hours reading and singing to them, telling them fantastical stories, reciting rhymes and limericks and generally outlasting even their cries of, “one more time”.

Joyce was the epitome of a lovely old English lady. In fact if you were to Google the words, “a lovely old English lady” Baba Joyce’s picture would surely appear as an image. Always jolly, always with a kind word or a complement for everyone she met, Joyce also had a rare gift for listening to other people’s problems, which she always seemed to think could be solved with a nice hot cup of tea (properly made of course with fresh water and fine china). With an unbelievable drive to always be helpful in any way, and never be a burden to anyone, Joyce always did what she could to help out even as her health deteriorated.

Throughout her life Joyce had a childlike innocent belief in all things mystical. For her, the fairies in the forest, the angels protecting the kind hearted (and those pure at heart), and the conviction that goodness always overcomes evil were truths that were there if you really took the time to look and find them. Joyce always found these truths and they gave her the strength, courage, and resiliency to live a full life full of love for family and friends alike. She will be missed.

For those who wish memorial donations can be made to Doctors Without Borders or St. Volodymyr Cathedral of Toronto

Beginning July 16, 2021 the Bereavement Authority of Ontario is once again permitting visitations and services to take place that are open to the public. We must continue to maintain physical distancing, the wearing of masks and may not allow more than 50 guests at any one time. Once the maximum limit has been reached, we will ask any additional guests to kindly wait outside in a physically-distanced line until there is room to enter safely.

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