Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Dear friends,
I`m sorry that I am unable to join you as you remember Kay.
Kay was forever young, wasn`t she? This frail woman who was always fashionably dressed; who was unsteady on her feet but would never consider using a cane; who was too fragile to become a nurse but who lived to celebrate her 95th birthday; who didn`t marry but treasured a host of family and friends.
Like a carefree teenager, Katie lived for social occasions: coffee parties, luncheons, cocktails - any excuse to sit down with friends, swap stories and laugh. Even when her deafness threatened to interfere, she soldiered on, guessing at the bits she missed and always joining in the laughter.
Thank goodness Katie didn`t sell her cottage. After Pete died she certainly considered it, worried that she couldn`t manage it alone. Each year, however, the thought of returning to Port Franks would sustain her through another Toronto winter, and her health improved exponentially as the date of her departure approached. New blinds, a new front door, new windows, a new dishwasher, a new fridge, a new electric fireplace - each summer she sought to enhance her cottage. This summer she was planning to pull up the old carpet in the kitchen and lay fresh linoleum.
When Katie told (and re-told!) the stories of past summers in Port Franks, I never felt she was dwelling in the past. It was as if the cottages along Mud Creek (sorry - the Old Ausable) still rang with the voices of Aunt Ethel, Aunt Aggie and Uncle Frank, Florence, Dawson, Mac, Pete, Grant, Bill, Charles, Jim and all the other young people who trooped off to the dances at Ipperwash and Grand Bend every weekend.
Thank you, Katie. You have taught me to appreciate - indeed to celebrate - the value of family loyalty. I will try not to let you down, and I will honour your memory, always with a smile.
Love,
Joan
