PATRICIA JOAN NORRENA (aka PORTH) (née BENHAM) PAT)

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PATRICIA JOAN NORRENA
(aka PORTH) (née BENHAM)

Died Thursday, December 26, 2019.
Born May 23, 1937, to Hugh Avery and Mary Lile Benham in Winnipeg, Pat grew up here, except for four years in Ottawa, until she migrated to Toronto the winter of 1963, following her divorce from Donald Frederick Porth, whom she had married in 1960. After two months in Ottawa working to help elect Mike Pearson and his Liberal government, she joined Style Magazine at Maclean-Hunter. Absent a year at Eaton's editing the internal journal, she stayed with Style and became editor in 1970, later joining Retail Council of Canada until 1987, when she set up her own freelance desktop publishing concern, including editing Canadian FundRaiser, an electronic newsletter.
She met Al Norrena at the apartment building where they both lived in 1970, and in 1972 they moved in together, with his son Scott from his first marriage to Beverley. Their daughter Paula stayed with Beverley, although the children alternated weekends until they ceased to be children, and everyone remained close before and after Pat's and Al's 1984 marriage, where Scott's first official act as an adult was to sign the register. The family, which always included a variety of cats and dogs and, briefly, a hamster, found its strengths in playing together, camping, canoeing, playing tennis and skiing, and spending a couple of weeks a year at the Benham cottage in Lake of the Woods.
In addition to tennis and skiing, Pat played basketball in high school and college despite her vertical challenge, and also played squash, cross country skied, and curled. In her freelance years, Pat volunteered for a variety of business and charity concerns, and found satisfaction in the rewards made possible by her absence from the 9 to 5 life. Hers and Al's move to Bradford enabled her, for a few years, to enjoy the gardening which had been so much a part of her mother's life. She was a "crazy dog lady" mother in sequence to King, Simba and Bogey, as well as innumerable cats. On moving to Sandycove Acres, she discovered the joy of "village" life in a community where everyone supported everyone. Her final residence was The Barrieview in Barrie.
She hopes to be missed and fondly remembered by Al, son Scott (Tammy), stepdaughter Paula, and son Tom (Penny) (Tom had been adopted at birth and they had reunited at the ages of 36 and 56 respectively). She always regretted that geography and disparate lives prevented her being as close as she would have liked to grandsons, Timothy Setterfield (Jessie) and Jeremy Setterfield (Roo), and grandchildren, Maddie, Luka and Gabriel Marks, and Creighton Jones, but she hopes what memories they have of her are warm. She also hopes for a place in the hearts of her sister-in-law Eleanor (brother Hugh having predeceased her), brother Bill (Carolina), and brother Donald, as well as her many nieces and nephews gifted to her by her brothers.
She leaves this life, as probably everyone does, wishing she'd done it all, but content and happy to have loved and been loved, and to have accomplished at least some of her aspirations.

As published in Winnipeg Free Press on Jan 04, 2020