Sylvia Ann Wicka

If you're about to toss that umpteenth charity solicitation with the rest of the junk mail you just picked up, stop for just a second and think of Sylvia Ann Wicka. Known to all who knew and loved her as Sissy, she entered eternal life on Friday, March 7, 2014, at the age of 60. She lives on in this world in the hearts and memories of her son, his wife, their baby boy, four brothers, her mother, nieces and nephews she doted over, and a large number of other relatives, friends, and students whose lives she touched so profoundly. Sissy had the biggest, most generous heart and she always shared whatever she had. If you forgot your lunch, half of hers was yours. If you needed a ride or a coat or a shoulder or a hug, she was there for you. She always had at least $20 to spare for the endangered animals or the hungry kids or the scientists searching for cures. She loved books and animals (she was particularly fond of St. Francis of Assisi) and politics and traveling. She especially loved Germany, where she spent part of her childhood in a military family and where she returned to serve her country in the U.S. Army. It's where she met her late husband and where she took her boy for a summer when he was young. It's where he will scatter her ashes. And daisies, oh, how she loved daisies. Sissy gave of herself, her time, her talents, her treasure. She gave everything she had to anybody in need. If somebody needed tutoring or help buying a book at National American University, where she worked, she was there for them. She started a drive to collect books for elementary schools in her beloved Albuquerque. She was her 91-year-old mother's caretaker for several decades, taking her to doctor's appointments and the grocery store and out to dinner. She sent goodie packages to her nieces in Wisconsin and Colorado and always talked about "my girls." She was known as a mom to so many, but she had just one child herself, Garry, the light of her life, to whom she imparted all of life's lessons, like being kind to animals, which she taught him by taking him as a toddler to feed the ducks at the ponds at UNM. Be good to others. Share whatever it is you have. Because somebody else needs it more. Do what you have to do. Stand up and be heard. If there's injustice, fight it. If there's a problem, seek a solution. If you have to get on a city bus bright and early every morning and go across town to get your kid to a better school, do it. If you have to teach math yourself in grade school because of budget cuts in the school district, you volunteer to do that, too. If you find a stray, pregnant dog wandering the neighborhood, you take her in and when she has her litter, you get her puppies their shots and take care of them, too, until finally you find them all good homes. And if your 8-year-old goddaughter is having a tough time and you can't be there to comfort her in person, you order her a subscription to a kid's magazine so she can feel better. Always thinking of others. Giving of herself. Everything she had. Sissy leaves us with other lessons that allows her spirit to endure in so many ways. Plan for tomorrow but live for today. Bask in the sunshine but enjoy the rain. Take pictures. And show them off. It's OK to be proud of your kid. That light shone doubly bright a little more than a year ago when Garry and his wife Jen had a baby boy they named Greyson. That little boy brought so many smiles and so much joy to her life, which was only fair seeing as how she brought so much love and laughter into all of ours. Sissy is also survived by her mother, Angelina Stapleton, her brothers John (wife Eileen, children Paul, Collin); Jack (wife Diane, children Billy, Kristin); Drew (wife Donna, children Katie, Karen); and Arnie (wife Kate, children Jordyn, Miquela, Ashlyn); and numerous in-laws and other relatives and good friends including Billy Martinez and Donna Russell. She was preceded in death by her husband, Army Spec. Garry Robert Wicka Sr., her father, Air Force Staff Sgt. Hubert Stapleton, and her grandmother, Emeteria Melendrez. A memorial celebration will be March 11, 2014 at 4:00 pm at French-Lomas Chapel, 10500 Lomas Blvd. NE, Albuquerque, NM 87112. Please visit our online guest book for Sissy at . FRENCH - Lomas 10500 Lomas Blvd. NE (505) 275-3500