The Day the Earth Stood Still

I’m sure many stopped today to reflect on this day last year. It was quite amazing the number of people who dropped everything and went to the hospital. Here we are a year later, people's lives carry on and become busy.

Byran’s Uncle Foster and Aunt Rose Marie came from Trinidad and Tobago that day and missed seeing Byran alive by a matter of hours. People stood around Bryan’s bed and comforted each other. It had been an arduous journey for Byran that led there.

Here is a story of another friend who was struck by a sudden cancer diagnosis in 2004. The old School Council had regularly met for dinner long after our kids had graduated:

Sometimes you have those eerie coincidences in your life. Jan. 30 we had an ACI Council Alumni dinner, just because it seems the height of winter dreariness, long after New Year's celebrations and before things begin to thaw. Sonia called late in the afternoon saying she fell and was too sore to even sit up, she mentioned that Philip Wong was in the hospital. I called May (Philip's wife) to see which hospital he was in and to see if he might want some visitors.

Last night (Jan. 30), Bill, Yvonne, John, Margo, Patty and myself sat down to dinner at Montana's Cookhouse at 7 o'clock. We got up to date on things happening with us all. We talked about Philip. I did not realise there were many people on the "old Council" who did not know that Philip was sick. He had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer mid-November 2003. He was taking chemotherapy treatments.

I suggested that a visit from all of us might boast his spirits, especially since he was quite determined to go to the Jan. 27 ACI School Council meeting until it was deferred a week due to the snow storm. Patty mentioned that Philip was interested in seeing us that night but wouldn't have been able to eat at the restaurant. We agreed to go after dinner.

Discussions turned to other events and anecdotes. We didn't finish until after 9 o'clock. We talked about whether it was too late to go to see Philip but we thought we could talk our way into seeing him. It was snowing outside. I brushed off the van and we all got in.

At the hospital, we approached the nurse's station to say we were there to visit Philip, she said he was in the room down the corridor. Only as we approached the room, did we realise there was a large crowd outside Philip's room and were told that he had slipped into a coma after 7 o'clock. We were initially stunned but then the family encouraged us to go inside and visit with him, as he would have wanted to see us.

Although the plan was to go back to my place afterwards, we decided to just go back into Montana's for coffee once we got back to the restaurant parking lot. We talked a lot about Philip. How he had spent over 7 years on the ACI School Council and Chinese Parents Council. How he was active and involved. How he was well respected and friendly to everyone. We had concern for his daughters; one at university and one in Grade 11 in high school.

He was always soft spoken and so polite. He would bring articles for "The Link" to my house and apologise for being so delayed when in fact many of my other contributors still needed to send me material. He would be worried that the four different sized lay-up's he did for the Chinese version of the article might not fit the space I had.

It was past midnight before we left the restaurant. I thought about if we knew Philip was in a coma, we probably wouldn't have gone. If Sonia had gone to dinner, we probably wouldn't have known where Philip was. I likely called May during the few minutes that they were at home.

I pulled into my driveway. The fresh snow blanketed the neighbourhood in silent stillness. A few snowflakes danced and flew in the lights then to the ground.

May called me this morning to say Philip passed away at 2 am.

In memory of Bryan and Philip, also Don, Cathy, Nancy, Anne, Nellie. And in tribute to Carmen, Richard, Patty, Ave, Margaret, I plan to do the “Ride to Conquer Cancer”. It’s a two day ride to Niagara Falls during June 20-22, 2008.