Muriel Alice Valji
Our beloved mother, Muriel Valji, passed away peacefully and surrounded by family in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, on Friday, July 19, 2024. She was 92 years old.
Born in Chicago on December 9, 1931 to Ronald Clark and Laura M. DeWane, she grew up as a city child with a single working mother during the Depression. Her worldview was formed by that early experience. She received a Bachelor of Arts in English and Master of Arts degree in Education from the University of Illinois, but soon discovered that acting rather than teaching was her true passion. She met our beloved father, Sherali E. Valji, at an international students association gathering in Chicago. They were married until his passing in 2005 and raised four children in Westfield, New Jersey.
Muriel was idiosyncratic to say the least. An unconventional mother and grandmother, she was smart, funny, well spoken and well read. Her many friends adored her. Her deepest interests were all cultural. Theater was her main passion, and she acted in numerous plays and musicals in community theaters in New Jersey. Muriel was captivated by all forms of dance and was regarded as a fantastic dancer (including Zumba in her later years). She loved great literature, international music, and foreign languages. On a few occasions, she befriended immigrants to the country and taught them English while they taught her their first language. She was fascinated by world cultures, but her airplane phobia relegated her to being an armchair traveler. And despite being a proud Luddite, Muriel still managed to receive by mail a constant stream of Netflix films on CD from a queue in her personal online account. That many of her children and then grandchildren adopted some of her many interests is her enduring legacy.
She is survived by her loving children, Karim Valji (Jon Maypark), Sharon Deal (Alan), Steven Valji (Wendy) and Nini Adams (Scott). She also leaves behind her 11 grandchildren, Matthew Valji (Diana), Andrea Roggenkamp (Brett), TJ Deal (Erinn), Steve Deal, Allison Valji, Lauren Valji, Caitlin Valji, Kyle Adams, Dylan Adams, Chris Adams and Tim Adams, as well as four greatgrandchildren, Joshua Valji, Fiona Valji, Cora Roggenkamp and Dawson Roggenkamp.
A celebration of her life is being planned for this fall in Westfield.
August 15, 2024
