The words used to capture the life of Maggie Haynes must be chosen carefully as she was a formidable critic of the use of language. Her nurses in Guelph, Ont., remarked that she was constantly correcting their grammar and vocabulary in the days she spent with them after surgery for a broken hip. She was an avid Scrabble player and crossword puzzler - but only of the most challenging puzzles.
One of two children of Nellie and James Crombie, a coal miner, Maggie's life experiences read like an account of a heroine in the Girls' Annuals of the last century. She taught ballet as a teenager, married Anthony Dymott at 19, had two daughters, Patricia and Gillian, and experienced India, Ceylon, Eritrea and Aden with Anthony's career in international trade. She farrowed pigs and flew a small plane, was an expert horsewoman and shot crocodiles in the jungle.
Maggie and Anthony came to Canada in 1955, and divorced in 1960.
In 1961, Maggie married Eric Haynes with a love that has lasted beyond her final breath.
Maggie had a passion for animals: There was Queensway Baya Khan of Cooch Behar, her Afghan hound, commonly known as Booboo; Cinnamon, an Irish setter; Blarney the Irish wolfhound; and Hamish and Lizzie, her miniature schnauzers. There were many cats. The Nubian goats, Petal and Petunia, were a bit of a conundrum as Maggie was also a keen gardener. She loved teddy bears and was proud of her collection of Harrods signature bears given to her annually by Eric for many years.
Maggie loved throwing dinner parties. She would tell some of her stories and have her guests rolling on the floor with her brilliant caricatures of people from her past. Her wit could be acerbic and sometimes one had to have a fairly thick skin.
She was a stickler for manners, teaching her daughters to eat bananas and peaches with a fruit fork and knife and constantly directing her grandchildren to "hold your fork and knife properly."
Over the past few years it was hard to witness her decline. Eric cared for her at home after she fractured one hip. As she became more and more housebound, she also withdrew from friends and started to suffer from confusion and memory loss.
While her prodigious memory came into play as we passed evenings singing old songs and recalling poetry and lines of Shakespeare learned in our respective school days, she struggled to remember the events of the last half hour. She, however, will never be forgotten and we shall enjoy and revisit our memories of her for many years to come.
Gillian Federico is Maggie's daughter.