Mother’s stolen ashes found by chance along roadside
Lois Gordon says the unlikely reunion with her mother’s stolen ashes is nothing short of a miracle.
“We finally have some closure and some peace, for her and for us,” Gordon said Wednesday.
Gordon’s mother, Mary Myers, 91, died peacefully in her home in rural Strathcona County May 25.
Gordon recalls bringing Myers’ remains back in a small cherry wood chest wrapped in a green velvet bag from the funeral home.
A private memorial was planned for July 23 to lay Myers’ ashes to rest in a family plot next to Myers’ husband and infant daughter.
But on July 8, Gordon heard alarms ringing in her mother’s home.
She rushed to the scene just as a man sped past in a grey SUV.
Among the items stolen was her mother’s ashes.
“To have her torn from us again by some vile person ... was unbearable,” Gordon said.
After appeals to the public turned up nothing, Gordon said her family had given up hope of ever finding Myers’ remains, and on July 23, they planted a rose in the spot where her mother’s remains should have rightfully been.
On Monday her phone rang. Vicki Paquette and Betsy Davis, with McLeod River Locating Ltd., had been sweeping an area near Range Road 212 north of Highway 15 for communications cables when Paquette saw jewelry littering a nearby ditch.
Paquette and Davis found jewelry and documents, including Myers’ last will and testament.
When they learned a small box with Gordon’s mother’s ashes was also missing, they returned to the spot — around 30 km from where the items were first stolen — with Gordon, digging through the tall grass with their hands until they found it.
“I must have stepped over it probably at least three or four times,” Davis said.
Myers was finally laid to rest Wednesday morning.
“Bringing her back to me and putting her gently in my arms was an astounding feeling of closure that I can’t explain,” said Gordon, adding: “Two strong women found another strong woman and brought her home to us.”