Pace on Earth

Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere

For as long as I can remember May 1st has been a date of note in my extended family because it is my quasi-big brother Scotty's birthday. What I did not know is that May 1st was also my grandfather's birthday. My (middle) namesake Desmond Pacey died in 1975 when I was less then a year old. There is a picture of him holding me but I have no memory of the man. All I have is the legacy of his life's work in literary criticism and academia. He edited our high school english textbook, Our Literary Heritage, and was enough a part of UNB's history to have a street named after him (I like to say that the street was named after I spent enough money at the Social Club - it's not true). By all accounts he was brillant, driven man and champion of Canada's distinct literary heritage. He played a role in adding to this legacy by nurturing Canadian authors like Alden Nowlen. He also wrote his own fiction and poetry and this is the poem that appears on his headstone:

The fluted fear
the chiselled grief
are all the means of our relief
and in solidity of stone
we cheat the transience of bone.

But beyond his work I've never had a good picture of the man - for example I had no idea when his birthday was. I had an impression of him as being consumed by his work but as my father and his sister's recalled him on his birthday this week a different picture emerged. He was indeed passionate about his work but he had the same passion for his family and life in general. This passion was passed on to Dad and maybe some of it to me. They all still miss him 30 years after his death.

I know some of the story of how he ended up here but there are holes. I know that he was born in New Zealand but ended up in Canada, teaching at the Univerity of Brandon before accepting a position at UNB. That's how the family laid it's roots in Fredericton; roots that dug in when his children started families of their own. Roots that got deeper when I bought a house in Devon. Roots that get deeper every time I see the sunset over the river.Scotty and I can trace our roots to the day after I was born when he came to meet me at the hospital. Those roots got deeper as we grew up together (which is an ongoing process - he still gets toys for his birthday) and got as deep as you can go when he and Nicki asked me to be Sophie's Godfather.So now when Scotty and play rugby together and Sophie smiles and reaches for me I am awfully happy that my grandfather chose to take a job in Fredericton.

Happy Birthday Boys.

Pace out.

posted by Vitamin S @ 12:44 a.m.