Mary Merlocco (née Luciani)

Mary Merlocco (née Luciani) was called home to the Lord on February 5th, 2022, in her 103rd year. Mary was the loving daughter of Camillo and Rosaria Luciani, younger sister of John (Teresa) and twin of Nick (Anne). Her husband, Alfred (Fred) Merlocco, passed away in 2019.

Our treasured Matriarch had an abundance of love and pride for her family. She is survived by her devoted children Catherine (Nick Bellisario), Fred (Loretta), and Ron (Silvia). Cherished grandmother to Leann (Noel), George (Jennifer-Rose), Anthony, Dianna (Matt), Natalie (Claudio), and Katherine (Robert). Nana also had the immense pleasure of having and holding great-grandchildren: Ethan, Hannah, Alice, and twins Lauren & Emily. Also feeling the loss are many nieces and nephews and loyal friends.

Mary was born in the family home in the Junction District of Toronto, on September 6, 1919, just after the first World War and the tail end of the Spanish Flu Pandemic. Mary, a child of immigrant parents, grew up during the Great Depression, attended elementary school at St. Cecilia, and learned to cook, sew, knit, and darn. These early experiences formed her steadfast values about family and religion.

Family is important, she taught us. Family is love. She reveled in the times we all gathered as family, for special occasions, for birthdays, or for pizza and Hockey Night in Canada on the tv in the downstairs rec room. Her grandchildren will cherish their special times with Grandma: the tea parties, making pizzelles, sleep overs, shopping trips, chocolate chip cookies, Rummy-Q at the kitchen table, and enjoying evenings perched on the veranda, talking with the neighbours who strolled by. Each grandchild will treasure the personal Christmas stocking she made for them, and the afghans and baby blankets.

To know Mary was to love Mary. A more loyal, honest, selfless person does not exist. She held dear the many friends she met over her lifetime and from being an active parishioner at Immaculate Conception Church, to weekly volunteering at Villa Colombo tuck shop. Life was made special sharing it with her friends: trips to Florida, Nashville, shopping jaunts to Buffalo, dances at the Brant Inn in Burlington, visits to dear friends in Hamilton, cards with the ladies, a simple a weekly phone-date to chat or coffee at a kitchen table with a plate of pizzelles. For decades, the “Club” would get together monthly in each others’ homes for meals, cards, coffee, and laughs. With Mary, her good friends became family, and when it became too difficult to get out or talk on the phone, the friends would check in with her children and exchange warm greetings.

Unwavering in her love of God, Mary and her husband were founding parishioners at Immaculate Conception Church, enjoying coffee with Fr. Massey Lombardi and Fr. Fred Mazzarella after many Sunday masses. She prayed at many Novenas at Mount Carmel Church. And in her later years, when attending church became too onerous, she connected with God by viewing the daily mass from Loretto Abbey high school.

Our Mom and Grandma was healthy until the end of her days. She had the wonderful fortune of celebrating her 100th Birthday in 2019 with a party in her honour. Ever the dignified lady, she wore a bright gracious smile and exchanged great conversation with all those who considered her dear, drinking in every moment. Even with diminished eyesight, Mary knew who everyone was, and was recalling stories and events with precision. Graced with her unwavering tack-sharp mind, she started (at Christmas 2020) to compile a book of memories from her entire life for her family to enjoy.

In her final few years, Mary found life at the family home very challenging. It had been her home since the mid-sixties, but she chose to move into a smaller home, and the memories in those walls would have to live on in her heart. Mary appreciated the care she received from her caregivers throughout the years and especially from the staff and caregivers at The Villages of Humber Heights, who showed her kindness and friendship and made her comfortable in her final days.

God blessed Mary with a strong circle of loving family and friends which kept her safe and healthy until the end of her life. Her presence will be dearly missed. In the end, God gently took her by the hand and brought her into his eternal embrace, reuniting her with her parents and all those loved ones who predeceased her. It seems unfair to distill Mary’s long and rich life to a few paragraphs, so please leave us, the family, your memories of our lovely leading lady. We will need the stories to keep her as vibrant in our memories as she was in our lives.