Myrna Mae (Henke) Garren

"Dementia is a bitch." — Myrna Garren

Myrna Mae Garren, 86, passed away on July 28, 2026. Born October 20, 1939, in the Town of Center — at 86, that's to be expected, but that doesn't mean we're not going to miss the hell out of her. Per her wishes, there will be no memorial service; her ashes will be spread in the oceans near Mexico.

Myrna was born to Willard and Lillian (Miller) Henke, the oldest of six kids. She married Coy B. Garren and had one daughter, Michelle Micke Holtman, four grandchildren — Brandon, Will, Grace, and Dominic Micke — and one great-grandson, Noah. She also picked up a son-in-law, Todd Holtman, and two ex-sons-in-law, Will Nunez and Kevin Micke, whom she liked plenty even after the marriages didn't work out — because Myrna made her own decisions about who she kept around. She was preceded in death by a lot of people — she was 86, that tends to happen.

She grew up on a turkey farm and later kept chickens, which was enough to turn her vegetarian for the next 40-some years — no regrets, no looking back. She worked clerical jobs for years, and after her husband died, she didn't slow down for a second: nights at canning companies, cleaning houses, raising her daughter solo, and somehow still finding the energy to go back to school later in life and earn her degree while living in Milwaukee. She then went to work for the Milwaukee Police Department, because if you're going to work hard, you might as well work somewhere that matters.

Myrna was also an opera singer with a truly beautiful voice, and she once dreamed of touring Europe with it. That love of music never left her, even when almost everything else did. Near the end, when dementia had taken her ability to read a book, she could still read music — and she kept right on singing, in Italian, until the very end.

Dementia caught up with her in her 60s, but she got real time with her grandchildren before it got bad, and that mattered more to her than almost anything. She believed in spirituality, God, and an afterlife — and was fully convinced she'd known her daughter in a past life. Here's hoping that's true, and here's hoping they meet again. Near the end, in one of her last real conversations, she looked her daughter dead in the eye and said, "Dementia is a bitch." She wasn't wrong. It took her body, but it never got her spirit — her family made sure of that.

She was not alone at the end. Her daughter Michelle, two of her grandchildren, and Michelle's best friend Katie were by her side when she passed.

Special thanks to the staff at Gardenview and Pine Meadows, especially Jamie and Brittany, and to Interim Palliative and Hospice — Mandy, Chaplain Dennis, and Sarah — for taking such good care of a woman who did not make it easy on anyone and wouldn't have wanted it any other way.

Mid Wisconsin Cremation Society is assisting the family. Words of remembrance and online condolences may be left at MWCS.WS