Read Karen "KK" Klaus Rose's Obituary & Leave Condolences

In memory of

Karen "KK" Klaus Rose

Portland, OR, USA

1947 - November 13, 2020

1947 - Nov 13, 2020

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Karen Klaus Rose succumbed to cancer on Nov 13, 2020 at the age of 73. She will be cremated and her ashes scattered in a private ceremony; after Covid-19 restrictions are eased, a celebration of her life - featuring a plethora of good chocolate - will be held in the Bay Area. In lieu of flowers, Karen requests that you donate in her memory to the Oregon Repertory Singers, the Elephant Sanctuary of Tennessee, your local Humane Society or any non-profit you feel best reflects her commitment to animal welfare and support of local arts organizations.

Before she passed, Karen was able to help write her own obituary, which follows here:

"One of the few advantages of dying slowly is that you have time to write your own obituary. (Other advantages include eating as much chocolate as you want and no longer worrying about your cholesterol.) So here we go:

I was born in Visalia, CA on September 18, 1947, the long-suffering middle child of three siblings. I attended Redwood High School, College of the Sequoias, and Sacramento State University, where I met my husband, Rich, who was a kicker on the football team. Our first date included a kicking contest in which I sent a beautiful field goal right through the center of the uprights and he shanked it. I don’t know if that was on purpose or not, but either way: I won, because 51 years later he's still by my side taking great care of me.

Rich and I married in June of 1969 in a backyard ceremony led by a rabbi who went rogue and - unbeknownst to us - decided to conduct the entire ceremony in Hebrew. Needless to say, this was more than a bit confounding to Rich's Catholic family! To this day, Rich has no idea what he actually promised, and I'm not telling.

Our daughter, Melissa, was born in 1971 and in 1975, we three eventually settled in Lafayette, CA where we were smart enough to buy property before the boom, and silly enough to undertake the challenge of building the house on it from scratch. Raising a toddler on a construction site was a whole different kind of challenge, especially when said toddler insisted that wearing clothes was highly overrated. Then again, Rich and I were the ones who decided that it would be a good idea to put things like shingles and stone retaining walls on the inside, so I guess she came by her "weird" honestly. But we created amazing memories in that crazy house. It was always full of love, laughter, and cookie dough, as well as countless friends of Melissa's who became our surrogate kids, and - most notably - an exchange student from Holland, Marijn, who we still consider a daughter.

I spent a lot of time volunteering for various local projects, like running the snack bar at Springbrook Community Pool, making costumes for the local high school musicals and chaperoning all of Melissa's choir tours, making sure to do bed checks on roller skates in order to embarrass her as fully as possible. I spent the bulk of my professional life working for the Lafayette Chamber of Commerce, and retired as their Events Director in 2014 when Rich and I moved to Portland, OR to be near Melissa and her wonderful husband, Matthew. But I came back every year to work the Lafayette Art & Wine Festival, because I was just that much of a glutton for punishment. I probably would have figured out a way to do it again this year, too, if not for the damn pandemic....even if I'd had to make my sister push me around the grounds in a wheelchair.

But now we come to the end of this grand experiment and the time has come to take my leave. I said that two of the last things I wanted to be sure to do were to eat all the chocolate I could (which I did, thanks to the metric ton of Sees Candy my nephew sent me) and vote the Orange Menace out of office. And now that I've seen that I successfully played my part in that worthy endeavor, I can go.

To my beloved family and friends: You all know I love you all more than my luggage and knowing each one of you was the true success story of my life. I feel sure we’ll meet again on the other side to continue the party, enjoy some fabulous chocolate together, and properly celebrate the fact that thanks to the Neptune Society, at the end of my life I will finally manage to achieve a "smokin' hot bod."

All my love,
Karen"

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