It’s written that he passed away peacefully. In truth, he might have lived almost the entire last decade of his live somewhat peacefully, although it’s impossible to climb into the silently tormented mind of someone suffering from Alzheimer’s disease.
Some of us have had a very personal relationship with the mind-destroying affliction – a father, once a baseball player and a Major in the army, a leader of men all his life, reduced to a dependent octogenarian, and even though some have experience co-habiting with the affliction, none ever truly understands anything except the very personal effect Alzheimer’s has on a person’s life. We who have cared for and loved those suffering the slow decay of dementia only know how the decay affects us, we who are healthy, we who are able to cope with the deterioration of the minds of those we love. We only understand how the deterioration affects us, the caregivers. We have absolutely no concept of how it affects the sufferer, who has lost the ability to communicate.
We only know, when holding the hand of the afflicted, when we hear the soft, last breath exit the lungs, when the limp hand loses its soft grip on the fingers of the one at the beside, we only know, well, release.
It’s over, for both the sufferer, and for the caregiver.
When I received word that Big Sam had died, I thought to myself, “I should feel more than this, I should feel a lump in my throat and a twinge of pain in my chest.” I should, if nothing else, feel a sense of relief and release.
I always looked upon Big Sam as a friend, although he was a full decade-and-a-half older than me. In retrospect, the times he played catch with me in the back lane behind the house on the street where we both lived were less of a form of condescension from him to his youthful fan
,but almost a sense of gratitude that there was someone on the street who didn’t give a hoot that he was a hockey star, only that he was an older neighbour who loved to toss a ball back and forth with a kid on the street whose dad had suffered the ignominy of an aborted baseball dream.
His father was the fire chief, and his mother was a socialite of sorts, who went to all the teas and garden parties, and reported about them and the people she met on a radio program on CKGB. If there was a bride in pink rather than white, if a hair had been found in a home-bottled jar of marmalade, if a visitor from out-of-town was at a tea party, Ann Stanley knew about it, and she’s fitfully report the news on her radio program.
Ann would also incur the genteel wrath (albeit humorous wrath) of my own dear departed mother, inasmuch as she would lure me into the house five doors down the street with an offering of her latest batch of cookies, or a slice of fresh cake, and a glass of milk. There was nothing wrong with the invitations, my mother would often say, except that they came routinely a half-hour before my own lunch or supper was to be served.
Over the years, as I climbed tentatively into the world of business and suddenly crash-landed into the world of journalism, I had become acquainted with people in the world of athletics. I had been a money-lender with a couple of professional wrestlers as clients. When the media beckoned, I had interviewed television personalities like the entire cast of the Hollywood Squares, Tiny Tim (a huge Toronto Maple Leafs fan), Maurice and Henri Richard, Frank and Peter Mahovlich, Billy Harris and Dick Duff and Larry Hillman, and, on more than one occasion, the great Dean Prentice. Many of these hockey players had, at one time or another, been teammates of Big Sam.
Two things occurred to me, when I first heard of Big Sam’s illness – first, that my wife at the time had commented about how he had had the bluest eyes that she had ever seen (we were in an ice-level seat at Maple Leaf Gardens) and that I had never interviewed him. I hardly felt the need to interview him – because he was my neighbour, and I saw him every summer.
[caption id="attachment_18649" align="aligncenter" width="336"] Allan Stanley curling with Frank Mahovlich and Tim Horton.[/caption]
Sometimes, in more reflective moments, I wonder if we take our neighbours for granted, no matter what their stations in life. Is the radiologist who lived next door, the Olympic gold-medal
skier who lived down the street, the gold medal, world champion figure skaters who would visit the home across the street every summer, he guy who’s happily pick up a baseball and spend a morning with a skinny kid in the back lane, and never once talk about hockey – are these people really anything more than friends and neighbours?
In retrospect, remembering Kathy Kreiner, Bob Paul and Barbara Wagner, the radiologist next door, the MPP next to the store on the other side of the street, even the jeweller on the corner – remembering these people is less a form of hero worship than it is a sense of pride and gratitude that our town has provided such stalwart and memorable citizens, not only to my little world, but to a greater world.
Allan Stanley, four-time Stanley Cup winner, a guy who was supposed to have accompanied Barilko and Hudson on a fishing trip of some note, a hockey Hall-of-Famer, a 21-year Toronto Maple Leaf, and a friend and neighbour, is in another Hall-of-Fame today.
It’s hoped there are some baseball gloves where he is, so he can have a game of catch.
Feature Picture:
Three Stanleys in one picture – Bill Stanley, the Stanley Cup, and Allan Stanley.