Conyne Dyanne Brewer

Instead of writing a traditional obituary, Conyne's family decided to share some beautiful thoughts about her life.... Conyne has always been an avid feminist. She made me the man I am with how passionate she has always been for the feminist movement, her respect of men, women, and non-binary people in all walks of life. She worked at planned parenthood clinics, funeral homes, pharmacies, hospitals, battered women shelters, and many other places, but above all every place she ever worked- that she took me to often- was to help people. Always.   She was as selfless as anyone could possibly be. She was clever, a macgyver, able to innovate anything. She was known for being "overly prepared". She once bragged to me about how her car, her purse, her bag etc; had anything anyone could ever need in it. It's a habit I learned from her. I remember once there was a time when, for a joke photo, someone wanted a clown nose. She had one. In the center console of her car. Why? Well, you never know when you'll need a clown nose.   Theater was her passion, too- she was an extremely brilliant stage manager and director, actress, and costume maker. She made every Halloween costume as a kid, and she went hard EVERY year. No matter what I wanted to be, she'd make it. She spend hours upon hours crafting stunning costumes for myself, herself, or my father as family costumes. Once she painstakingly made a replica of Sally's dress from Nightmare Before Christmas. She sewed it with yarn and hurt her hands so badly but it looked fantastic, and later in life it fit her! And she wore it as her own costume 15 years after making it for me, and it always was the best Sally dress I'd ever seen.   She loved Nightmare Before Christmas, Tim Burton, Disney, Emily the Strange- those were things that anyone could get her for any occasion. She loved them. Everything Odd, Weird, Off-Kilter- that's what she was about.   She was supportive of me constantly. She never tore me down and never made me feel bad about myself and who I was. She knew more about me, my gender, sexuality- all of it, way before I ever did, and made me feel comfortable talking to her about it when I'd realized it. Before I realized my gender, she'd stopped using genders for me often- she'd say, "Z's my Kid. Just... Z's just Z."  She helped my pick my new name long before I knew my birth name would be my dead one.   She was passionate about animals. She helped me love them too. She rehabilitated some of the harshest animals I'd ever seen, and she was always gentle, and kind to them.  For my whole life, and long before I was born, she had a pillow we called "Lumpy". Lumpy's original liner- not the case, the thin liner around the filling that you put a case over-  had withered away and "he" eventually was just a pillowcase with a knot tied in it full of pillow stuffing that had become an amorphous mass. It was her ONE pillow and she kept it with her forever.   My mom was always extremely kind and could read people extremely well. Nothing could really get past her. She was an avid writer, she had always wanted to write a full book, but never did. Instead she used to do audio books, which the whole family listened to.  Family photos were her favorite, but they were always intensely themed. She LOVED the theater, costumes, and characters. Once our Christmas cards were us dressed up- i as a mobster and her as a 1920s Flapper girl- and had black and white 1920s Mafia Christmas cards every year. She loved to MAKE things, intensely creative, able to make art out of literally anything. She was so good as an event planner and a party decorator.  On events, she hosted and managed MANY high level events such as the Vagina Monologues. I attended many of these as a kid and she absolutely loved them. She was so proud of managing these gigantic events with hundreds of people attending, and hosting events and art booths for people to make abstract paintings, booths for sex education and safety. This was so important to her and she started my education herself when I was young to make sure I was as safe as possible.   She was intensely charming, sweet, and genuine with her compliments, which she gave extremely freely. She never hesitated to make someone feel better about themselves, to compliment people on their hair, makeup, clothes, style, and talents.  She was amazingly kind and generous. She gave everything to everyone and was happy with very little of her own personal items, because she was happy to give the clothes off her back to help someone else.