I am honoured to be called by Norma last Sat. when Doug was dying in Arnprior Hospital .
It was such a special time and we held hands around his bed and said the Lord’s Prayer and family members kissed him goodbye. I heard a doctor say some years ago at a death bed “What more could a man ask in death than to be surrounded by the LOVE of those he loved”
Norma and Doug are a special couple. Great assets to this congregation and community.
- When Mary and I retired here 20 years ago to this village where we grew up, I didn’t know if it was the place for us. Hadn’t lived in a village for 50 years. But it is a great privilege to live here because of people like Doug and Norma, who make this a community –where people care about one another. Both Doug and Norma are givers who bind us together in church and community.
- Like Doug’s coffee club at the Harbour Store, which he mentions in his memoirs finished just before his death. I was given a copy the day he went to the hospital – just as they got the published copies.
- Norma asked him to autograph my copy. He was writing something. Norma said “just your signature” but he wrote in the copy: to Jack and Mary. Jack will be o.k. in his operation. OK. Doug
- I was having a small operation in the hospital Tuesday and there was Doug in his final illness thinking of me.
- He always thought of others. He served others.
- He helped me often. I was terrified of pumps – wells –pipes – when I settled in an old house in the village.
- Doug was a great help as he understood the mystery of water and pipes. When my pipe to the outside tap froze and burst, he put in a new copper pipe with a slant to the outside so that it would drain outside. When I broke the handle of the tap in the bathroom trying to turn off the water he put in Dylex or something fixture….he said “Don’t force it …it just fits together to shut off the water”. I have to learn that lesson in life. Relax..don’t force things.
- Doug was a philosopher: wiser than many who use big words.
- When he fixed things in our house, we discussed – skiing – golfing – and the affairs of the world.
- A very wise man – he gave me down-to-earth tips on all sorts of topics. I think of Doug when I turn on taps to enjoy God’s gift of water. Christopher Wren built many churches in London after the great Fire of 1666 including StPaul’s Cathedral – but he has no monument. It is said “Look around you: all these magnificent churches are his monument. Doug’s monument is all around in the plumbing fixtures he installed to channel water.
- Marriage – as in his obituary – …’to the love of his life’. Norma – 39 years ago who lost her first husband tragically – leaving her a widow with two children to raise. The Bible says “it’s not good to be alone”. But men and women are different, I’ve discovered. Doug and Norma were mature people with different gifts. They worked at their relationship – it was a great marriage – they were good friends. They did so much together – church – golfing – restaurants – trips – they were celebrators: they had fun. Norma cared so tenderly and faithfully as his ailments multiplied.
- They have been great assets to this congregation.
- Doug was a steward and did the plumbing in the bathrooms of our new hall.
- They were faithful attenders. Even when he had difficult walking. I can see him recently going down the ramp with his walker.
- Real human beings with old-fashioned values, yet winsome flexibility bending to changes of this new day. They care for their families and their welfare.
- Norma and Doug were always telling me of their achievements, the marriages, their get-togethers, etc. – sisters, brothers, grandchildren, nieces and nephews. Doug was rich with relatives in the hospital.
- The community of seniors:those in need -plumbing – so many acts of kindness with the lonely and the sick. Doug visited Lyle Craig (Lillian’s son) up in Griffith and did some plumbing for both.
- So both were artists: Norma with her gift for poetry and painting and Doug – his plumbing – and stories – I loved to talk with him – numerous great gifts – skiing –fishing – golfing – out of doors.
- But our greatest work of art is a life well lived.
Doug created that – humble, honest, giving – a celebration – made one happy to be alive in this adventure of life. Enthusiast – en (in) theos (god).
He was an example – a mentor to so many (Obituary) of how life is to be lived and how one dies with grace. As Layton said of grace:‘ski carves a path following the symmetry of the hill” Doug would know that grace as a skier: one with the hill –balanced. He practiced it in life.
He lived in a State of Grace: showing light and love to those around him. He had simplicity and naturalness like an animal at home in the world. Doug as a child of God was at home in the world. He was given an eternal soul by God to form and guide his body and now that soul has returned to his Creator and his spirit is free and dispersed to each one of us.
Doug says in his memoirs ‘he was never a teenager’..we grew up in the hungry 30’s and we went to WAR as teenagers – life was hard and real – but Doug was always a child, an enthusiast who saw life afresh. His eyes would sparkle as he told of family and friends – of fishing, skiing, golfing. He told me of his adventures on his ship the UGANDA – a wonderful story.I saw a play “Absence of War” in London by David Hare – done something special to serve their country in wartime.
Cathy McGuire, his neice in the Harbour Store said how they miss Uncle Doug to tell them of ski’doing’, and seeing a deer. He shared the magic of life! “Except ye become as a little child, ye shall not enter the kingdom of heaven”..
Roy Fraser was a Prof. at Mt. Allison University , grew up F. H. Learmonth descendent wrote“Happy Journey” …His student Mel Thistle was grieving when his beloved professor died in 1958 …he gave me a piece he wrote fitting for Doug
- The man is dead – Now will his people gather to say good things – recalling this and that among his deeds and sayings, now will his people, grieving for a full ripe man, be enlarged by fullness, ennobled by his ripening, for this is the work of grief. And from his death a quiet joy shall rise, for none among his people knew his magnitude, nor shape until he was completed.” This man is dead. Yet deep in the awareness of his race are words he said and certain deeds that followed: These shall grow like trees he planted and like trees give shade and fruit to many whom he did not know and men unborn”.
Doug’s words and deeds are seeds that will grow and produce fruit for those yet unborn.
“He being dead yet speaketh”. THANKS BE TO GOD FOR DOUG.
