"I'm Going To Marry Peter When I Grow Up"

Globe & Mail Obituary, October 2012

My earliest memory, ever, is of Peter Morton and I dressed in matching sailor suits, his is white and mine blue, and we are standing for a picture taken by his Dad in front of the Morton's cottage on Indian Point.  I think I must have been three.  Peter's Dad was in the Navy during the war, and loved all things nautical.. thus the sailor suits.  I loved Peter.  Almost all of my cherished childhood memories, and there are many, include my best, and in reality, only, friend Peter.  When I grew up I was going to marry him.  I measured my life's relationships by a standard set against my memories of my love and loyalty to Peter.  We spent every summer and holiday together from the time we were toddlers and his parents bought property on land that at that time belonged to my great uncle and aunt, Indian Point. Our family lived there. This was the setting for all Peter's and my adventures, 2400 acres of grasslands and forest surrounded by lake. The Point was five miles long and had ten miles of shoreline.  It was a natural and enormous playpen.  There were no predators to speak of, so Peter and I had full run of the entire peninsula, and aside from being terrified of the dark, there wasn't much else that frightened us.  We camped on our own from the age of six, and continued to explore every mile of that wonderful piece of land and lake until his parents sold their cottage when we were twelve, and moved to Brockville.  Even then I took the train to meet up with Peter at their cottage in the Thousand Islands on the St. Lawrence River until we were fourteen, and Peter was shipped off to boarding school in Lennoxville, Quebec.  Although our parents continued their friendship, I lost touch with Peter over the years.  He moved to Calgary, I stayed in Ontario for University.  I moved to the Westcoast, he moved to Ottawa.  I moved back to Toronto, he moved to Washington D.C.  He married, I divorced. We met up three times after our separation in our early teens. The first time, while he was writing for the Calgary Herald, he called me 'Sweetie', and was so tender toward me that I felt the love of our childhood affection flood back immediately. He was wearing grey flannels, Weejun loafers and a jean jacket. Perfect for his image of part Establishment, part rebel.  I was traveling with my future husband, Gordon, and there was never enough time to have a really good visit.   I saw him again when I remarried and was visiting in-laws in Ottawa.  We had our three sons with us, and I barely squeezed in a visit with Peter, his wife Cathy, and their four daughters.  My husband, Don, asked Peter if he had the same sunny-side up infatuation with me during our childhood as I had remembered about Peter.  His answer was as much about Peter as it was about our friendship.  He asked Don how he could have felt otherwise about the prettiest girl on Indian Point.  He stayed loyal to his wife, Cathy, while making my heart swell.  We corresponded by e-mail after that, and had a couple of endearing phone calls.  He wanted me to visit him in Washington D.C.  I had been writing stories based on our childhood adventures where Peter always played a starring role.  He was inseparable from me and my idea about myself.  The last exchange Peter and I made was one of my stories which I sent to him by mail, for a set of silver bangles which he posted to me.  He bought them in India when he was doing a post-high school tour of the world with a friend.  They were en route to Goa, but had run out of money.  While they sat waiting empty-handed for American Express (Dad) to deliver funds, they were befriended by street children who fed them and looked after them. Peter bought the bracelets in memory of the incredible generosity of children.  And then he gifted them to me.  I like to think that Peter and I shared that same generous spirit when we were kids, and I think we did.  If he was hurt, so was I.  If I was happy, so was he.  We shared everything, but mostly we shared each other. I feel his presence still in my life, and if truth be told, I think he's watching out for me.  Truly Grateful.