Friday, December 6, 2013
I knew Roy in the 1970s when I was a teenager, labouring under the weight of undiagnosed medical and psychological disorders. When I first came to know him, he had just experienced the stress and grief of selling his herd of dairy cattle and entirely changing his way of life. Economic conditions were such that I remember him saying that GICs provided a higher rate of return at that point than farming. I knew he'd rather be farming.
In the years that followed he was always tremendously supportive and generous to me, regardless of the situation. Not only would he provide transportation to a grateful suburb-stranded teen, he would insist on stopping at A&W on the return trip from KGH.
Like others, my Grade 13 year was spent in a small dark box which got smaller, darker and more depressing as the year ground along. Suddenly I was in a car heading south. There was music, sunshine, the ocean and - most importantly - heat. Later I made a formal attempt to use some of my saved dairy farm wages to compensate Roy for at least a portion of the cost of this wonderful experience. He wouldn't accept anything.
Roy's patience and generosity must have been tested when I started working for him at the CRCA. For the first full week I had naively shown up wearing my usual *white* dairy farm hardhat - our little work unit apparently needed *two* supervisors to keep Bob Martin in line. In later years, Bob commented to my brother that one had to wind me up to get me moving. Nobody knew my thyroid had shut down, but my efforts were never criticized by Roy - his sense of humour and his leadership kept us going.
One day 'we' were assigned to repair some loose tin at the very peak of the roof of the Gould Lake barn. It was a grey November day with strong gusting winds. The only one of us with the fearless determination to get to the top and slam the tin down was Roy. Watching from the ground, I excused myself for not having the necessary experience to contribute to the effort. Selfishly, less than a year later, I failed to consider that Roy produced formal written employment references for large health care institutions about as often as I climbed to the tops of barns in gales.
His typewritten document enabled me to begin a twenty year career at KGH.
During a particularly difficult and discouraging period of my life, Roy showed me such great kindness.
DJG
