Obituary of Mary Margaret Willems

Mary Marguerite McKendrick Willems met God on April 4, 2013. As Mary Margaret’s life evolved so did her name connecting the past with the present through experience to influence the future. While we intersected her life among these different names, God has always known her by her name. At birth, May 4, 1946, in West Palm Beach, Florida’s St. Mary’s Hospital, she was given the sophisticated, romantically influenced name of Mary Marguerite. The pronunciation lent itself to the grandeur of tradition and the economic evolution that her matriarch Pleasant and patriarch McKendrick parents had experienced over the previous decades. As she grew up a new name emerged which would stick with her friends and family for the rest of her life. Not able to muster Mary Marguerite, her brother, John DeMilly McKendrick, Jr., tagged her with a shortened reference to sister, the more convenient Cis. Her early life revolved around her extended family’s houses in Richmond, VA and summers in West Palm Beach. Turning to college, Mary Margaret graduated from the Medical College of Virginia's School of Nursing. With nursing skills in hand Mary Margaret took to traveling and living in such places as Haiti, Cuba, and various places around Europe. As a nurse Mary Margaret spent much time as a volunteer Red Cross nurse, a connection she shared with her mother, Frances Julia Pleasant McKendrick. By way of her brother’s introduction, Mary Margaret met Navy Lt. Robert “Bob” Cecil Willems in 1972. Marrying in 1974 in the backyard of 103 Dundee Avenue in Richmond, the couple moved to Monterey, CA . While there, a daughter, Julie DeMilly, was born in 1976. From California, a move to Boston brought new experiences as well as added another family member, Robert Todd, in 1978. Orders soon came for the family to relocate to the coast of Mississippi in 1982 and they settled in the bedroom community of Long Beach, MS for over 20 years. Life in Long Beach shifted Mary Margaret to be known as Mim by her friends and Ms. MM by her children’s friends. Time in Long Beach allowed Mary Margaret to join the Friendship Oak Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, participate in her church community at First United Methodist of Long Beach, spend a tenure as “The Colonel” at Classy Coverups, and influence her two children into being the upstanding individuals they are today. Mary Margaret fostered an exploratory home life which exposed the family to world traveling, an eclectic roster of exchange students, and thrifty budgeting which included the buying of extra gallons of milk, drinking a glass or two, and freezing the rest all due to the milk being on sale. On any afternoon, you could find Mary Margaret and the rest of the Steel Magnolias sharing their wisdom over a cup of coffee at various locations around Pecan Park. Thoughts of retirement and a switch to the next life stage brought Mary Margaret and Bob to Tracy City, TN in 2004. She quickly integrated into a church home at Morton Memorial United Methodist, did significant work with both Mountain T.O.P. and Grundy County’s Relay for Life, and installed the family’s traditional Christmas Eve and Easter meals on the new set of friends. Mary Margaret became known as Mimsy to generations of folks involved with Mountain T.O.P., the Christian outreach program for which she volunteered her countless talents. Mary Margaret named herself Mimi in 2009 in a well planned ceremony that coincided with the first time she held her granddaughter, Mia Fern. Not to be outdone, the Mimi moniker was amplified in 2012 with the addition of her second granddaughter, Ivy Sue. Her grandbabies brought her much joy and entertainment on trips to the beach, Disney World, and fiesta dinners orchestrated by her creative daughter-in-law, Sherry Sample. A Celebration of Life Service will be held Monday, April 8, 2013, at 2 PM CST in Monteagle, TN at Morton Memorial. In lieu of flowers, Mary Margaret requests that donations be made to Mountain T.O.P. Day Camps (PO Box 128, Altamont, TN 37301), Morton Memorial Mountain Christian Center Food Ministry, or Morton Memorial Gospel Partners (322 W Main St, Monteagle, TN 37356).