Debra Olson
World traveler Debra Olson began her final journey home about 9:30 a.m. Monday, July 5, 2021, after dying of complications from ALS at N.C. Little Hospice in Edina.
A memorial service is pending.
Deb was born June 2, 1949 to Albert and Beatrice (Zakariasen) Olson in International Falls. She graduated from Washington High School in Brainerd in 1967 and Lutheran Deaconess Hospital School of Nursing in 1970. She worked as a mental health nurse for almost a decade while pursuing a BA in Liberal Arts with an emphasis on writing and photography from Metro State University. She then embarked on a 12-year journalism career working at several daily newspapers around the state including the St. Cloud Times. She won numerous awards for her writing and photography.
Traveling was a lifelong passion. In her early 20’s she backpacked through Europe for five months with two friends, camped with her sister across the western U.S. and Canada for three months and traveled solo throughout Mexico for two months avoiding tourist areas. She visited dozens of countries on five continents including USSR, China, Peru, Namibia and South Africa.
She returned to nursing in 1991 working in Willmar and at Fairview Riverside Hospital in Minneapolis. While working in several areas of nursing she pursued a masters degree in Transcultural Nursing at Augsburg University. As part of the program, she studied in Mexico and Namibia.
She was grateful to her parents for giving her a solid foundation by providing her with a stable, loving, Christian home that sparked her life-long pursuit of social justice. She was an outspoken, opinionated feminist and peace activist with an irreverent sense of humor.
As one friend said her “Christmas letters were legendary, filled with wry (political) humor and deep truths.” Four words that guided her were “Be courageous and kind.”
By far what she treasured most were he relationships with family and friends. Whether the friendships were new - with her caregivers at the hospice - or close to six decades long they were what brought joy to her life and sustained her through the hard times including her father’s death and breast cancer.
She had big plans for retirement including traveling, tracking down ancestors in Scandinavia, volunteering, spending a lot of time with her mom and other family and friends and haranguing politicians. But fate conspired to keep her in health care - as a patient.
There were fun times, too. She and her sister Cindi threw the Queen Bea a 100th birthday party and she was able to visit friends and family in Arizona.
Deb is survived by her 102-year-old mother, Beatrice (Bea) of Staples; one sister and brother-in-law, Cindi and Larry Mertens; two nephews and their families, Jacob and Kelly Mertens and their children, Memphis, Mack and Boyer; Dustin and Erica Mertens and their sons, Trey and Ty, all of Roseau; uncles and aunts; 41 first cousins and many treasured friends who were her family, too.
She was preceded in death by her grandparents, Cara and Louis Zakariasen; Vendia and Gustav Olson; her beloved father, Albert Olson; many treasured aunts and uncles; one first cousin and several special friends.
Memorials are preferred to Women Against Military Madness (WAMM); The Minneapolis Indian Womens Resource Center and the ALS Assoc. of MN/ND/SD.
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