MARY ELIZABETH TOOMBS

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MARY ELIZABETH TOOMBS 1921 - 2015 Mary was born on September 10, 1921, and died peacefully, as she wished, on June 25, 2015. Her memorial service was held on June 30. She requested that, in lieu of flowers, donations be made to Rossbrook House (658 Ross Ave., Winnipeg, MB R3A 0M1) or a charity of your choice. The family thanks the nursing staff of Grace Hospital, Unit 5 North, for their attentive care, particularly Kyah, RN, BN. Mary will be sorely missed by her beloved husband Gordon, to whom she was married for over 71 years. Her sister, Jean Buxton from Edmonton, and her sister-in-law, Bunny Knight from Saskatoon, will miss her personal visits and their warm telephone conversations. Her love, support, and encouragement will be missed by each of her three children: Patricia Susan Wagner (Neil) from Alberta, Daniel Donald John (Salley Knight) from Boston, and Lowry Gordon Toombs (Donna Houston) from Alberta. She will also be mourned by 12 grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren. While getting her BScN in nursing in 1944, she managed the first campaign that elected her father, Roy Knight, as the CCF Member of Parliament for Saskatoon, a position he held for three terms. Two days before she died, the last item on her bucket list' was to see the federal Conservatives defeated. After marrying Gordon Toombs, an Air Force officer, in March 1944, they were apart for 18 months while he was overseas. During this separation she was a RN in a school for delinquent girls in Quebec. After the war and Gordon's ordination as a United Church minister in 1947, she became the minister's wife in his first pastoral charge. In 1950, with three children, the youngest one month old, she followed Gordon to Edinburgh, Scotland, where he studied for his PhD. While there, she pursued her interest in psychic or spiritual healing and religious drama. Individually, they both gained from several dozen hours of psychoanalysis offered at a cheap price only to couples. In 1952 they were back in Saskatchewan, in a rural town where Mary did some part-time work as an RN and organized community concerts every fall, each time directing a play. In 1956 when Gordon was minister in Regina, Mary became a member of the Social Welfare Council and later the first social worker at the Provincial Geriatric Centre. Mary's theatrical skills continued to shine. She promoted the Regina Little Theatre by directing plays for them, and for two years was the adjudicator for high school drama festivals throughout the province. Later, as a teacher at Kelvin High School, she directed the annual musicals for several years. From 1961 to 1963, Mary supported the family as a psychiatric night nurse while Gordon trained in pastoral counseling at the Menninger Clinic in Topeka, Kansas. They returned to Canada, and in Winnipeg, she thoroughly enjoyed being a nurse educator at the Winnipeg General Hospital. She realized her nursing skills were dated, so in 1968, at age 46, she returned to university. She obtained her BEd and, eventually, her MEd, while she enjoyed being a counselor at both Kelvin and St. John's High Schools. Mary's interest in spiritual healing led to courses in therapeutic touch and ortho-bionomy, also helping many family and friends. On becoming a professor in Counselling Services at the University of Manitoba, Gordon had some responsibility for non-credit human sexuality education courses. In 1972, the Faculty of Education asked Mary and him to co-teach its first credit course in Family Life and Sex Education. In preparation, they went together to the Kinsey Sex Research Institute in Indiana for further training. This led to the Sex Attitude Reassessment Seminars that they jointly conducted for the Faculty of Medicine's first-year students until 1976, and later for many professional groups in the province. They had fun working together, and with their bantering, taught students about conflict resolution in the family. In retirement, common interests and team-teaching skills led to Mary and Gordon offering a variety of short courses in Centering Prayer, Congregational Retreats, Aging-A Sacred Path, Living Your Dying, and several other topics. One of the Dream Appreciation groups they co-led lasted 22 years. Mary will be missed as a long-time member of Unit #77 of the United Church Women at Westworth Church. She will be deeply grieved by members of the School Masters' Wives Association that met for either bridge or crafts every Monday for decades. She valued her membership in the writing group, Scribes, sharing her poignant short stories. Some of her poems won awards and were published. She was a life-long knitter, designing some of her projects, and finishing her last sweater with help in January 2015. Whenever Mary walked into a room with that wonderful smile of hers and such a keen interest in other people, she brightened everyone's world. She was a wonderful storyteller with a terrific, sometimes risqué, sense of humour. Her compassion for and understanding of others was very highly valued. It is hard to imagine a world without Mary in it. In our memories and our hearts, she will always be with us.

As published in Winnipeg Free Press on Jul 11, 2015