Remembering Dad. An update.

 May 3-4, 2018 

Remembering Dad- an Update.

Twelve years ago this evening, at Edenbank, a most beautiful residential complex nestled between Chilliwack and Cultus Lake, my dad and I pulled an " allnighter". 

He was dying from congestive heart failure. I'd been at my parents' home for 3 days, and would be going back to the city the next day. It was sunny and warm. My mom, dad and I enjoyed what was to be my dad's last real meal. Fish and Chips from a local British shop. 

Later that night, my mom took out her hearing aids so she could get a good night's sleep and I camped on the floor at the foot of the bed. Mom slept great! Dad and I not so much. His kidneys were failing and he was restless and up every 30 minutes. All through the night.  It was rough. But now I feel that spending that time with him was such a gift. My sister T. arrived the next day to take over and at around 4:45, just as the sun was at that magic hour on May 4th, my birthday, I kissed my dad goodbye, and said " I love you Daddy". He lay in his bed and although he didn't open his eyes, he replied, "Ditto". A family joke that meant the world to me. He died the next day.

Original post:

Saturday, September 5 would have been my father's 95th birthday. 

Here's a look back on his remarkable life.

There's a special bond between fathers and daughters. My dad was my hero. It didn't matter where I was or what I was doing, if Dad was there, I knew I was safe.

I said goodbye to my father on my birthday in 2006, knowing I wouldn't see him alive again. I told him I loved him. He whispered back "I love you too". Dad died the next day at the age of 85. Sometimes it feels as though he's been gone forever.

 Dad lead a remarkable life. He was born in 1920 in the  warm Crimean peninsula of  southern Russia. His mother had been widowed 3 months prior to his birth. The Russian Revolution of 1917 had unleashed chaos and lawlessness in villages all over the country and famine and disease followed. One of his older brothers died of starvation and his  mother succumbed to typhus by the time dad was 5. No one wanted an extra mouth to feed  so he was shuffled around from relative to relative. Eventually he and his remaining older brother were adopted by a childless couple and in 1930 they immigrated to Canada.

Dad's passport photo age 9 , bound for Canada.

First day of school in Canada

 Dad entered Grade 1 at the age of 10.  There were no English as a Second Language courses, no support. It was sink or swim and boy, oh boy, did my dad ever learn to swim. 

He was determined to learn English quickly, became a bit of a rebel as an adolescent and at age  17, hitchhiked from his home in Lethbridge to Rosthern Saskatchewan to attend a private college that he had heard from friends might be a good fit for him. His adoptive parents had not supported his decision  to pursue higher education instead wanting Dad to remain  on the family farm. For many reasons, it  remained a strained relationship throughout Dad's life. 

On leave during WWII. 

 It was at Rosthern Junior College that Dad met my mother.  My mother liked to  tell us about their first date, going to the movies and that she was so impressed because Dad had a dollar to spend, a whole dollar!
 In the early 1940s, Dad enlisted into the Canadian Army  and was stationed in Lethbridge Alberta at Internment Camp #133  home to 20,000 German Prisoners of War. He worked  in the Dental Corps and was also the camp's translator, having learned German  as a child in Russia.
 In later years we would love to hear dad tell  stories about those years in the camp  and his relationships with some of the POWs. Simply amazing.
The things that went on behind the wire....Read more about those days here

Dad, front row, far right with other members of Dental Corps

  My parents were married in 1944 and when the war ended they headed for Vancouver and UBC where dad earned his teaching degree. To make ends meet,  Dad sold men's shoes at  Woodward's department store in downtown Vancouver. One day he had to fill in  for someone in the ladies shoe department and as the story goes, after one shift declared "Never again! Those women  don't buy anything! They just keep trying on more shoes!"

UBC graduation  1951

Mum and Dad  finally settled in Chilliwack BC  in 1953 with their 2 young daughters with one more,me, to arrive  several years later.

My parents on Granville St. Vancouver around 1945 . Photo taken by street photographer Foncie Pulice.

One of many family picnics at Crescent Beach.
Dad the protector :)

 Dad  was a secondary school teacher for many years, then principal, and finally  director of secondary education for the district (now referred to as assistant superintendent).

He retired in 1979.

Although Dad was busy with work and service organizations, he always had time for his family.  One of my favourite memories is of him reading to  me. He continued that with our children too. He loved his grandchildren and was always thrilled when my sisters and I plus our young kids would  descend upon our parents' house and fill their home with laughter  toys, and so many little boys!

Dad reading to my son 30 years later.

Reading to me.
Love the  Don Draper/ Mad Men look. 

Jack's three  daughters had 3 little boys in one year!

One of Dad's and my favourite things ever.  Dad took me to see Muhammad Ali vs George Chuvallo  when I was a kid. It was a spectacle beyond belief. We relived that evening a hundred times over the years.

Keeping cool at Mum and Dad's pool in Scottsdale AZ

Dad, you were the glue that held our family together, and even now, after eight years it's still hard to believe you're gone. You were my rock, my hero and sometimes my 'partner in crime'.

 I miss our talks about politics, world affairs and history. You were such a good and patient teacher. 

Thanks Daddy-O.  I love you.

Somewhere I hope you're saying with a wink, " Ditto, kid"

My 21st birthday

Mum and Dad on their honeymoon in Banff 1944

University Women's Club ( Hycroft) Vancouver

JFK Sept 5, 1920- May 5, 2006

Remembering Grandma 

 Katharina/Katherine

Nov. 18, 1887- April 29, 1971

Katharina circa 1909

Like Chekov's Three Sisters.
Katharina (right) with sisters Lena and Lisa 
The Russian version of Downton Abbey!

My lovely maternal grandmother was born on this day long ago and so very far away. I  am so very fortunate to have  had the chance to know her. She died when I was 11. Grandma Katharina/Katherine had a remarkable life. Born in Southern Russia in 1887 in a place called Friedensfeld ( Field of Peace). Life was very good for her family for a time. They were landowners, ran a paint factory and a flour mill. Their days were filled with music, literature and lots of love.  Against her parent wishes, Katherine married a 'lowly' but ever so handsome and learned school teacher and they had three children.  

 Then in 1917 the revolution came and things got very, very bad.  

My maternal grandparents Katharina and Gerhard

The family's large estate and all land  and property was  taken away.Villages  were destroyed by gangs of lawless marauding bandits. Katherine and her husband Gerhard learned that he was on a list to be sent to Siberia or killed.  The revolutionaries  wanted to eliminate all academics fearing they were a threat against the new communist regime. The decision was made to leave Russia and immigrate to Canada.

My grandmother had to leave her parents behind. They  chose to stay, thinking things would get better. They didn't. My great-grandparents ended up dying in Siberia.

First by wagon, then by train and finally in Southampton the journey to a foreign land began. Grandma was 5 months pregnant with my mother when the 10 day voyage across the Atlantic began on the Empress of France. 

Disembarking in Quebec, they travelled by train arriving on the Saskatchewan prairie in July 1923.  My grandfather carried  a grand total of 36 dollars in his pocket, a seashell from the Crimea and his beloved violin. My grandmother had her samovar for making tea. That was it. 

The family Samovar used for tea making.  

A shell brought along so the children could always remember the sound of the Black Sea. Home.

 Katherine gave birth to my mother in November of that year and had 2 more children. Although they had their worldly possessions taken away in  Russia, my grandparents gave each of their 6 children the gift of love, music, poetry and a good education. In their later years when they had moved to Chilliwack BC my grandfather I am told, could be seen around town on his bicycle visiting the sick and elderly in hospital. He was a compassionate man. Although he died before I was born I am so thankful to have known my grandmother Katherine. She lived to be 83.  

Probably my favourite photograph ever. Grandma Katherine

( Katarina-right) with guitar. Taken at their estate at Friedensfeld Southern Russia when life was good. 

Forever Summer- Forever Sunday

Katarina top right with her parents and siblings around 1908 .  

 From peace and prosperity in Southern Russia ( above) to a  hard life on the Canadian prairie (below).

The Dirty 30s, life during the Depression years. My mother standing at the table. Grandmother in the doorway.

The family embarking on the Empress of France July 1923, bound for Halifax and a new life on the Canadian prairie. Grandma  pregnant with my mother, the first of the family to be born in Canada

A whole new  and different life on the Saskatchewan prairie.

  I'll always remember my grandmother's beautiful silver hair, so long she could sit on it. When she was in her 80s we kids would visit on Sundays and sometimes she would get this far away look in her eyes and she was off, reciting Russian poetry by heart. Didn't understand one word, and it was beautiful.

 Love you forever Grandma Katherine