Michelle Drema Reed, 85, of Portland Oregon, passed away on June 21, 2023.

Drema was born on May 7, 1938, in West Virginia and was adopted by Cecil and Ida Marts at the age of eighteen months. Her adopted father was a Marine. They lived in Southern California but moved to Orland, California where she spent her formative years. Throughout high school, Drema was an amazing athlete—a dancer, diver, swimmer, and cheerleader. She also belonged to many social groups. After high school, she attended Chico State University, where she met Robert Reed. They were married for five years and had three children, Kim, Shel, and Teal.

As a young woman, Drema lived in Southern California where she worked in Hollywood. She danced in the movie Bye, Bye, Birdie, and worked in the accounting offices of LucasFilm Ltd., during the making of the original Star Wars movie. Drema was also an ER nurse, and a waitress as well as held various other jobs while raising her three children. In her fifties, Drema moved to Saudi Arabia to work in a hospital as a medical transcriptionist. When she returned to the US, she started her own medical transcription business in Seattle and shared the business with her daughter, Teal. One of her most favorite accounts was the Seattle Seahawks. She was a huge football fan.

After retiring in her 70’s, Drema decided to go back to college and pursue a degree in Archeology. In 2015, she graduated from Portland State University as the most “Senior Senior” and was featured in the local news. With her new archeology degree in hand, she traveled to Belize to work on several digs and recounted many memorable stories from the trip. Also in her retirement, she had many creative endeavors. She performed with a local senior community theatre group, enjoyed drawing and painting, tended to her patio garden, and wrote and published several cozy mystery novels under the name Drema J. Reed.

At age 80, Drema and her childhood best friend, Joy, traveled to Florence, Italy, and stayed for a month, touring the sites and enjoying the country.

Drema was a vibrant, strong woman with an unquenchable zest for life. She is survived by her three children, Kim Chinn, Shel Reed, and Teal Reed, as well as her grandchildren, Alex Greenstreet, Malone Trahan, Teal Chinn, and Caden Reed, and great-grandchild John Fossil Greenstreet.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations be made to either St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital or Tunnel to Towers Foundation, organizations that were dear to Drema’s heart. 

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