(Read at Katharine's celebration of life, October 1, 2016)
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I prepared to celebrate Katharine’s life today by reading and remembering, by walking and thinking, and by experiencing for many hours these past few days, a mixture of sadness and grief, gratitude and love.

I would now like to share some of my many thoughts in a story and a poem.

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First, the story. It is about friendship. Although the version I tell you today will be brief, the unabridged story is never-ending.

And as I tell you my story, I invite to remember how you and Katharine became friends and how your friendship grew.

Forty-four Septembers ago (that would be 1972) I met Katharine in Mr. Few’s Grade 7 class at Bernard Elementary School. It was a new school for me — in fact, the second new school in less than a year. In a couple of months, our family would be moving from Yates Avenue to Park Drive, and in preparation, I switched schools at the beginning of the year. I was excited to meet my new classmates, especially Katharine Kelly, who I learned lived on Park Drive, a few doors down from our new house still under construction. I was so happy when Katharine agreed to be my friend, and eventually my best friend. Katharine was smart, pretty, sweet, good at sports, and liked by everyone — everything my 12-year old self wanted to be.

In Grades 8 through 10 at A.D. Rundle Junior Secondary School, our friendship continued and evolved, and our circle of friends expanded.

At A.D. Rundle, Katharine, Brenda Fedoruk, Susan Pedersen and I played recorders in The Four Winds, a quartet created by the band and choir teacher, Mr. Dale Warr. Katharine was first soprano, equivalent to lead singer in a rock group. Not only did we perform atconcerts, but under Mr. Warr’s direction we had grand adventures and misadventures as he drove us to venues from the Interior to the Island in his classic V.W. van.

In senior high, largely due to being in different classes (I followed a sciences track), our friendship entered a dormant phase. After graduation in 1978, we went our separate ways until we reunited on the joyous occasion of Rob and Katharine’s wedding in 1982. Unfortunately, soon after we lost touch again. (I returned to university to study nutrition and apply for a dietetic internship.) But soon after our 10 year high school graduation reunion (1988), which I did not attend, Katharine reached out to me by letter and rekindled our friendship, which over time deepened and became unbreakable.

For many years, my annual September “staycations” have always included at least one West Vancouver seawall walk with Katharine when we talked easily and without stopping, detouring from the seawall at the Silk Purse to view art and then at Delaney’s to sip coffee. We talked about our families and mutual friends, art and nature, our beloved dogs, Violet and Piper, and some of our favourite books and authors, such as A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle.

Thursday afternoon, while Piper and I walked the seawall in Yaletown, I thought constantly of you, Katharine. Constantly. In my mind, I heard you remarking on the warm and gentle autumn sunshine, the blue sky streaked by a few white clouds, and the gentle lapping of waves on the rocks during the low tide.

Katharine, thank you for being my dear and eternal friend, my anam cara, my soul friend, with whom I shared my innermost self, my mind, and my heart.

***

In her book A Ring of Endless Light, Madeleine L’Engle wrote “Poets are born knowing the language of angels.” As many of you know, Katharine was a poet.

I now share this Mary Oliver poem with you, in memory of Katharine.

Messenger

My work is loving the world.
Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird —
   equal seekers of sweetness.
Here the quickening yeast; there the blue plums.
Here the clam deep in the speckled sand.

Are my boots old? Is my coat torn?
Am I no longer young, and still not half-perfect? Let me
   keep my mind on what matters,
which is my work,

which is mostly standing still and learning to be astonished.
The phoebe, the delphinium.
The sheep in the pasture, and the pasture.
Which if mostly rejoicing, since all the ingredients are here,

which is gratitude, to be given a mind and a heart
   and these body-clothes,
a mouth with which to give shouts of joy
   to the moth and the wren, to the sleepy dug-up clam,
telling them all, over and over, how it is
   that we live forever.

****

I want to do this and I don’t want to do this.

I want to celebrate Katharine’s life and comfort those who loved her, but I wish the occasion for doing so was not a memorial service. In other words, I wish Katharine were still alive on earth, in her beloved home and garden, being a mother to Emi, and a wife to Rob, a sister to Tricia, a sister-in-law, and a dear friend to so many of us.

I still find it hard to believe there will be no more seawall walks with you. And I cannot bear to think this strange and terrible thing.

I would now like to end this part of the story with some of my favourite quotes from Madeleine L’Engle’s books. These quotes remind me of Katharine. I hope they may give you, Katharine’s family and friends, comfort, courage, strength, and hope.

“Nothing loved is ever lost or perished.” (A Ring of Endless Light)

“We turn to stories and pictures and music because they show us who and what and why we are, and what our relationship is to live and death, what is essential, and what, despite the arbitrariness of falling beams, will not burn.” (A Circle of Quiet)

“Goodbyes are not easy, but I’m ready to move on….I don’t have the answers to the questions but I have some good questions. I have loved life, but I believe that life is to be loved, it is a gift.” (Certain Women)