Grandpa Joe, spinning tall tales and yarns to the kiddies c. 2007, Sophie's b'day party
Many years ago, sometime in my childhood, my Dad made an offhand comment to me that when he passed away he wanted all traces of himself, photos, etc disposed of; presumably so it would be like he never existed. It was a radical concept so foreign to my embryonic sense of ego and self-importance that it shocked and surprised me. I've contemplated it ever since, though never considered asking him if he recalled saying such a thing or had modified his view as time passed.
I watched on helplessly and with horror as his life ebbed away in the early hours of July 16th and knew I'd never know the answer. So unexpected and such a shock - Dad always seemed indestructible, or at least on a toughness scale far beyond us. Which isn't to say he didn't get hurt or sick, especially the former as he tended to exert himself with great energy into activities under conditions that I'm sure he was confident he had complete control of, but from our perspective looked like a wanton and reckless disregard for personal comfort or safety. I can't recall exactly when he started running but by the time I was an undergrad in the 80s it was marathons, and then upwards of 5-6 a year, working through the annual circuit of Boston, NYC, National Capital in Ottawa, Toronto, and Marine Corps in Washington DC. Rock climbing became a passion later in life and he seemed to be out tackling the local challenges constantly. In need of some additional conditioning, my ever-practical father constructed a colossal and ingenious personal climbing gym, built off a central "chimney" of posts embedded in concrete, right up the side of the family house.
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| The Joe Bray Climbing Gym: Built to Last |
I was describing this structure once to my colleagues, and fellow Acton-ite TDA exclaimed with astonishment "So THAT was YOUR house !!!", as they used to walk their dog past our property and often speculated as to what on earth the massive outrigger of scaffolding was on the place.
I spent countless hours with him during the endless drives to swim practices as an adolescent, (11 workouts a week and often all -weekend competition as well), and I loved to hear him tell the stories of his undergrad days working summers for Fisheries Research in the high arctic. I am grateful he finally documented and then self-published these memoirs in a book that I now treasure. It was a privilege to have attended two different high schools at which he was a senior administrator, and saw first hand the fondness and respect he commanded from his colleagues. Dad was a wonderful writer and very dryly funny, with a penchant for sly and creative practical jokes. He began working in stained glass as a sort of hobby-business into his retirement years, and over time attained prodigious skill. He took on projects of ever-increasing difficulty, from Tiffany lamp reproductions through astounding custom pieces including an enormous replica of the Mayan sun calendar (!). After many years he began creating outdoor installations of astonishing folk art, multiple layers of kiln-fused glass with a mysterious and deliberately cryptic vocabulary of pictorial symbols; left to us all to "figure out".
When he was diagnosed with prostate cancer at 65 he tackled it with characteristic stoicism, shrugging off visible displays of discomfort and fear, and recovering after a radical prostatectomy and rad to emerge clear of cancer until his death. As I got older I recognized and appreciated the courage and determination it must have taken for him to have turned his back on the family farm, land his family had worked for generations, to seek a wholly independent path and higher education, first at Guelph and then at McGill. It was invisible to us as kids, but it must have set up a rift between himself and his own father in particular that may never have healed. He never pursued his true love of science as a profession, as he took teaching jobs for income when he started a young family and settled into a career. My own path in science was hugely influenced by him, though I would often joke that with his background in botany and zoology he was "Macro", while I was very much "Micro".
This forum is not the place for an expansive bio, and I imagine that he would not have wanted such a thing in public view anyway (see above), so I will leave it with the obit I tried to write in a fashion he would appreciate, capping it with some lines that resonated with me from his beloved Robert Service:
b. Wiarton, September 26, 1938 to Almer and Alma Bray
(deceased)– died Milton, July 16, 2016
BRAY, Joseph Russell, of Acton, 77, died following a brief
illness at Milton District Hospital July 16th. Arctic
explorer, scientist, educator, long distance runner, stained glass artisan, and
above all devoted husband of Melanija, and father to Paul (deceased), Mark
(Sarah), Melanie (Ben) and Peter (Riina). Proud and loving grandfather of
Tessa, Sophie, Liam and Ronin. In his professional life Joe Bray was a
model of integrity and fairness; to his family, his deep, searching
intellect, self-sacrifice, discipline, kindness, and vast good humor was always
an inspiration. Joe Bray lived his life putting others before himself,
and his greatest joy was in supporting the accomplishments and successes of his
family. His abiding love of nature was reflected in his few indulgences
including marathon running, kayaking, and rock climbing, which he pursued with
typical great energy and enthusiasm. It is with the greatest
sadness that we say our farewell to him so soon.
A private ceremony will be held by the family at a future
date.
"Have you suffered, starved and triumphed, grovelled down, yet grasped at glory,
Grown bigger in the bigness of the whole?
'Done things' just for the doing, let the babblers tell the story,
Seeing through the nice veneer the naked soul?
Have you seen God in His splendours, heard the text that nature renders?
(You'll never hear it in the family pew.)
The simple things, the true things, the silent men who do things -
Then listen to the wild, it's calling you."
- Robert W. Service, Call of the Wild
