Lives Lived

Here we are, 2 days into 2011 and I've said nothing about seasonal festivities. Instead, here's what I hope the Globe & Mail will publish in its regular column, a sort of supplement to their death notices in which readers can volunteer an expanded version of the death notice, albeit a very brief one. Here is what we have produced collectively, to be illustrated by the topmost photo in the set I published on November 29.

LIVES LIVED

Janet Margaret (“Wendy”) Last

Wife, mother, grandmother, thrifty home-maker, international traveler, poet, story-teller, artist, altruist, Governor General’s Caring Canadian.
Born 14 October 1925, in Christchurch New Zealand, Died 15 November 2010 in Ottawa of ALS, aged 85.

Christened Janet Margaret Wendelken, her family name was preserved in her nickname. Lifelong learning defined Wendy. Scholarships took her to the elite Otago Girls High School in Dunedin, exiling her from home aged 13. Her school prizes are heirlooms. Competition for university places against men returning from war service deflected her to nursing.

In her self-deprecating way, she said her qualification for nursing was a strong back; but common sense, work ethic, sense of humour, tough-mindedness and warm heart were priceless assets. Her adventurous spirit, nursing skills, urge to learn more, took her from New Zealand to Scotland, nursing in NHS hospitals and privately. Her determination and indomitable will were proven when she had to raise funds for her passage to Britain, working off-duty nursing hours in an industrial laundry and a pickle factory. Her ebullient spirit shone through in how she related this story fifty years later. She saw Queen Elizabeth’s coronation, hitch hiked around Europe, nursed again in Perth, Western Australia.

In August 1955 Wendy and her friend Louise were hitch hikers, exploring Australia. Near Adelaide on a sunny spring day John Last, a young doctor on his way to play golf, picked them up. Wendy’s first words revealed her spirit of adventure, her sense of fun, her commitment to others less fortunate; and her smile captivated him. Abandoning golf, he spent the day showing them the farmland, vineyards, and rugged coasts south of Adelaide. They courted by letters across the Tasman Sea between Rangiora, where Wendy was nursing, and Adelaide, where John was a GP flirting with epidemiology.

They married in Adelaide on a scorching hot Valentine’s Day in 1957. Wendy soon had two children, Rebecca and David. In 1960 John left general practice for epidemiology. The family moved to Sydney, then to London, England, living on savings and a scholarship intended for a single man. Wendy’s domestic skills enabled them to survive, and they had fun discovering what to do free in London.

Thrift learned in her Depression era childhood was engrained in Wendy’s nature, as they moved from London back to Sydney where Jonathan was born, then to Burlington, Vermont, Edinburgh, Scotland, and finally Ottawa. In each new city, Wendy created warm and loving, albeit thrifty homes. Tin foil and plastic bags were reused. Styrofoam meat trays became insoles for winter boots. Old woollens were unravelled and re-knit as hats for the needy, threadbare sheets and towels were sewn together to give them years of new life.

Her impulse to keep learning and her irrepressible spirit made it easy to master in her mid 80s the high tech gadgets designed to compensate for ALS’s relentless destruction of muscle power: BIPAP ventilator, suction, power wheelchair, touch-screen speech aid helped her immensely. The whole family is beholden to the Canadian health care system and the compassionate, charismatic health professionals who helped us to care for her throughout the 18 month course of her disease.

She was grateful for life’s blessings, took joy in friendships and little moments of beauty, particularly in gardens, preserving these in poems and paintings. David and Jonathan have inherited some of her talent, and all three children share their parents’ love of words, literature and writing. She transmitted her love of gardens to Rebecca and thrift to Jonathan.

Wendy was a faithful friend, a caring neighbour, and a volunteer for many good causes: a Head-Start program for needy children, docent at the Museum of Nature, helping physically handicapped adults at the Jack Purcell Community Centre for over 25 years. She read books for the blind, provided primary school classroom support for English as a Second Language and special needs programs, unobtrusively performed countless other kind acts. Her lifetime of selfless altruism was recognized in 2003 with the Governor General’s Caring Canadian Award.

Rebecca, David, Jonathan and John Last