Take off your hat, I want to stand up.

Chapter 50: Shumy.

Chapter 50: Shumy.

Shumy

Dr. Morris Shumiatcher. 1917 - 2004

A most remarkable and patient man was wheel chair bound and living in the Wascana Rehab centre. Here he was attended by his many friends and good fellows.

This man was truly a great man. He was kind, generous of heart and spirit, a patron of the arts and a dedicated jogger. You could see him trooping around Wascana Park, with his head down and a determined grin on his bearded face. Winter cold, nor summer heat derailed this dedicated soul, on his daily run.

He was, at one time the key advisor to the Government of Saskatchewan, and the Premier, Tommy Douglas. I listened to a few of Morris Shumiatcher's fellow lawyers and colleagues talk of his court room prowess one day while lounging in the steam room at the health club at the Y.M.C.A. They bowed their heads and summed up in agreement, Shumiatcher was the best they had ever seen. He was the most prepared, deeply- layered, wise and patient lawyer. While in court he was a maestro, a prince, he played while the others broke a sweat. They continued by saying they could tell the moment Shumiatcher had tipped the legal balance and had won his case. He was that good.

My Grandad was a pretty fair checker player, he could read the game and was always five or six moves ahead of the opponent. When his opponent took one false move, he knew he had won. Shumiatcher had this ultra-keen sense in his legal dealings.

Wayne The Great One, could read the ice like no other. In one particular game, he crossed the opposition blue line, pealed left, cradled the puck and pointed to the ref. The ref counted the players on the other team. There were six on the ice, not the required five, penalty time. The Great One knew the player on his right should not have been there, as a result it was an Oilers power play. He had amazing ice sense. Shumiatcher knew the law in the same way Gretzky lived for his game.

The same held true for Dr. Shumiatcher, he was a legal Dynamo. We thanked him for getting my mom out of a tough scrape when her deceitful second husband tried to high jack half of her assets when she filed for a divorce. He went to bat for Ev and as a result the divorce came through. When the smoke had cleared both parties, parted company as if the marriage had never taken place in the first place.

Ev was never bitter about the situation. Rather, she had initiated the whole cat and mouse chase that lead to her marriage with David. She was duped. David was a passive aggressive low down, dirty liar. He was a deceitful, angry person, a former alcoholic, with very low aims and no personal ambition. He suckered her good.

Once divorced, Ev was fine. She would say that she had hoped for a different outcome, she just wanted to be happy. Her entire life she just hungered to be a happy person. She did find some happiness in whatever she did, however, being a wheelchair bound, dependent, quadriplegic was how she spent the majority of her adult life. It pains my heart. Yet it makes me determined to live my life with true and clear aims.

This brings me back to pushing Ev by the great man, Dr. Morris Shumiatcher in the Wascana Rehab Centre in 2003. In passing we always paid our respects to him in a quiet and revered manner. He knew us not. A terrible disease was shrinking him away from this world, it did not take his fine gentlemanly nature and kind heart.