Tamara was born in Vancouver to Sophia and David Knox. She grew up in Richmond. Tamara was a lifelong ice hockey fan and spent many a Hockey Night in Canada glued to the TV with her dad. She was a die-hard Canucks fan from day one, attending as many games as she could. If the Canucks were in the playoffs, she would be glued to a TV somewhere munching on chips and dip. If a Canadian team was in the playoffs, she would be following them.
Tamara loved to dance, if you were into the 80’s dance scene in Vancouver or Richmond you probably were in the same clubs as she was.
Tamara believed in the social contract and giving. She volunteered for several organizations including Rape Crisis Centre and Everywoman’s Health Centre. She was a prolific blood donor and would receive requests for her rare AB negative blood when there was a need. A proud union member, she had several positions in the Telecommunications Workers Union.
Tamara was extremely proud of being a BCIT graduate and one of the first female electronic students.
She started a second career in Funeral Service, graduating from the Canadian College of Funeral Service in 2006. She also volunteered her time for over 9 years, tutoring students at the college.
Tamara was capable of learning anything she put her mind to and found great joy in not just tutoring but teaching others how to learn and study affectively.
Tamara was an avid reader of almost everything, from the classics to murder mysteries, magazines to textbooks. She often was in the middle of several books at the same time.
Other hobbies/activities: Tamara was a sailor and owned her own boat with which she had a love/hate affair with. She was a certified scuba diver and enjoyed anything that was fast, although she could and would fall asleep going one hundred miles an hour down a country road with the wind in her face.
Tamara had a disarming sense of humour. She was also not one to let an opportunity slip by with her leap before you look attitude.
She loved to travel and went with her mother to Russia on several occasions and with her father to Britain. She frequently visited with her Aunt Vera at different U.S. Military posts in Hawaii, California, and Mississippi. She trotted the globe with different girlfriends to places like London, Paris, Cairo, Cabo, Las Vegas and more. She enjoyed travelling for business and made time to enjoy cities like New York, Washington, and Toronto. She was fluent in Russian and could get by in French. Tamara enjoyed getting her boots on the ground as much as she enjoyed the high life and was at home in a B&B or The Savoy. She often spoke of visiting her family in Russia and Ukraine and staying in either their Soviet era apartment or the dacha in Ukraine.
Tamara leaves behind many dear friends. She collected “onlys.” (Only children as friends.) She could pick them out of a crowd and was drawn to them. She loved animals, particularly one named Casper, a 140 lbs. Rottweiler who loved her back even more. In lieu of flowers, donations to BCSPCA are suggested.
https://spca.bc.ca/donations/make-a-donation/?utm_source=header&utm_campaign=donate
Celebration to honour Tamara on Friday, October 14 at 1:00 pm at Celebration Hall at Mountain View Cemetery, 5445 Fraser St., Vancouver.
Funeral professional friends of Tamara are invited to participate on an honourary level at her celebration. Please email RSVP@ANORAlife.com if you would like to participate.
Interment of Tamara’s cremated remains on November 25, 2022 at Oceanview Burial Park, 4000 Imperial St, Burnaby. Please meet at the office by 2:30pm and we will process together to her grave.
Oh Tamara! I cannot believe that you are gone! I have some great old pictures of you too…wish I had of known someone was gathering them. I see one up there of you and I when you came to visit us in Hope back in 2019. We shared some wonderful memories as kids (since 1963) and as teens. That summer in around 72 or 73 when I came to Edmonton to stay with you and you came back on the plane with me to Tsawwassen was so much fun! I was so excited when you told me a few months later that your dad had been transferred back to Richmond again. Our lives took very different paths as we came into adulthood and we lost contact for many years. Good old facebook reunited us a few years ago which was great. I was reading many of our old messages to one another and I’m so glad I still have them. I wish we had of been connected in the end…I am so sad that we weren’t and that you couldn’t share how you were feeling. I will miss you so very much….you were my oldest friend. Rest well dear Tamara…..I love you
Tamara, you are an unforgettable, unique and genuine human. I wish I could quote something brilliant in Russian for you, instead you’ll have to settle for a Maori one, “She who stands, lives. She who sits, perishes”. You, Tamara, we’re definitely a stander.
Be free
Tamara you were a great colleague and personal fiend. Your imput in the funeral profession was highly respected. I will miss our conversations and outings. Rest in peace my dear friend.
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Tamara I knew you in your BC Tel years. Such fun we had at work. I always respected your work outside the office. I ran in to you many years later in your second career. I am shocked an saddened to hear of your passing. Sending loving wishes. So sad
Tess, it still doesn’t seem real to me. I’m sorry we didn’t spend more time together the last 3 years. We had a great time. I’m grateful our shenanigans took place before cell phone cameras and social media. Love you, Cherie
No words can describe the wonderfulness of your presence when with you. You always brought joy with your beautiful smile and infectious laugh. I’ll never forget all the fabulous memories we shared when I would come over for delicious dinners with you and John. We always had the best conversations and laughs. They mean the world to me and I hold them deep in my heart and mind. My absolute deepest condolences to John and family/friends. With love always
We were union reps and convention delegates together for the TWU and often tracked the jargon used at the mic’s during sessions. There was always an “airy fairy”, “bang for your buck” or “loosey goosey” to chuckle at. The most memorable year was when the debate was on renaming “manholes’ to “person” holes. Today I can’t remember which won out, underground access, or maintenance holes? It doesn’t matter. It was rich with clichés and ridiculous dramatics, as was the usual tone at the BW Kings Inn in Burnaby.
For many years she was involved with WIT, the Women In Trades program, encouraging women to explore well paying careers, in traditionally male dominated workplaces. She was a well respected leader in this work and could out perform many of her co-workers.
Tamara was Russian and loved good vodka, cheap white wine, cats, dogs and road trips. She was a curious and complex human with a thirst for great authors and pay equity. Being an only child and caregiver for her mother through Alzheimer’s, took a toll on her health but refined her wicked sense of humour. Tamara always had great friends who were like her chosen family of support. I’m grateful to be one of them.
She had a big bold laugh that’s burned into my memory and my heart. Tamara had several different careers while I knew her, beginning with the phone company, first in Operator Services, then in a clerical role at Major Accounts. She eventually took the electronics test and worked her way up to Technician lll, on the mostly male “Craft” side of the business.
She left TELUS in the early 2000’s and trained to be a Funeral Director/Embalmer in Vancouver. It was another domain where men ran the show and women weren’t rewarded with the same opportunities in leadership roles. Tamara chose this field because as she said “the people were friendlier and just easier to work with”. Plus she loved to wear all the black clothes and call herself ‘Morticia’. It suited her! She was also a writer, poet and skilled funeral celebrant.
Tamara cared about people and she was a natural born worrier with an analytical mind. This made her particularly good in her work. I remember when she told me how lovingly she prepared the body of an ex lover, who unfortunately became her client years later. What a tender last gift to be able to give another soul.
After a dozen or so years gaining skills and being undervalued for her efforts, she reinvented herself again. She was an Embalmer Instructor but left the industry and retrained as a bartender. “Madge” particularly loved the mixology homework! On Oct 5th which would have been her 64th birthday I played P!nk’s “Raise Your Glass” and said Na Zdorovie, my friend!
I’m most sad that she didn’t make it long enough to receive her full pension, no one deserved it more. Tamara loved Rosie the Riveter and once gifted me a RTR “We Can Do It” nightlight. Her gift and her spirit will continue to shine in my home and memory for all time. Thanks Madge for your friendship, love and infectious laughter.
До свидания ~ Do svidaniya, my friend – (Goodbye in Russian) RIP
We met online over 20 years ago, (that’s nothing for many of you I know), after the death of our beloved dogs. We would never have crossed paths otherwise, but I will be eternally grateful that it happened, despite the sad circumstances. I used to say you had a brain the size of a planet, but I wish I’d also told you that you had a heart and spirit to match! You were always there with words of encouragement for this daft Englishwoman, and with plenty of laughs – we shared that dark humour, and a running joke about my birthday falling on Bastille day. Your emails were forever a source of comfort, just knowing I had a friend like you fighting in my corner, however far away that may be. You had me in awe with your busy life and mind, and I couldn’t believe your generosity of offering to loan my daughter a vintage sequined jacket you owned, basically to someone you’d never met who lived on the other side of the world! (I politely refused as I couldn’t bare the responsibility of it going missing in transit). You made your mark on this life, and planted love and humour into the lives of others that won’t ever be forgotten. Love you, sleep well. xx
While this is a very late message , I’m still in a state of sadness at the news that Tamara has passed away .
I haven’t had contact with her in over 40 years . And I’m not sure how I came across this obituary by sheer chance today .
I loved her very much back in the day , so much that we were married .
We were very young and it really seemed right at the time . I was also close with her Mom , who I knew as Mookie and of course with David . I actually stayed with David for a few months after the marriage ended ( 1979 )
David , Tamara and I owned a sailboat together and it was named after her mom , the Mookie .
I do come across old pictures of our time together whenever I’m going through old photos and actually have fond memories of that part of my life .
I have no idea what she felt about our brief union and though it was her decision to move on with our separate lives I always hoped she was happy .
To all of her friends , I wish you all peace a to have good memories of Tamara .
Rest in peace
Kevin Macauley