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My friend Tom recently turned 96. He still lives independently with visits from his adult children, personal support workers and the odd realtor trying to sell his house. This is a house he bought brand new in 1969 for the cost of what we’d spend on a car now.
I was first introduced to Tom when I took a new job in Toronto. It required working in the office multiple days a week but I lived in Kitchener, which meant that my commute was anywhere from an hour and 20 minutes to three hours, one way. As luck, or fate, would have it, a friend mentioned that her father-in-law lived close by and he’d hosted another Kitchener commuter in the past. She put us in touch.
We met at 7 a.m. on a cold November morning to see if this might work out. I’d be Tom’s first female boarder. Tom uses a walker, and so the second floor of his home sits unused – the perfect spot for a corporate millennial to spend a night or two in the city. I’d spend the rest of the week at home with my partner.
The rules were simple enough, I wasn’t allowed to clean up any paperwork or clutter (he said it was all in the perfect place), and I was to have a coffee with him every morning and read the paper. We agreed to try it out.
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Incredibly, Tom refused to let me pay for the room. So instead, after work, we chatted about our day and that always ended up somewhere in the past. He loves to talk about shooting snakes and squirrels at the family cottage and how he used to snowshoe across the frozen water in the winter. I heard how he built additions to the cottage and he pulled out photo albums to teach me about different saws or building techniques. At first I didn’t know how I’d feign interest, but I saw how happy it made Tom to share these stories and I genuinely grew to care a great deal about his life, family and cottage.
Sometimes, he’ll tell me about what it was like growing up in the 1940s and 50s. How he hopped a train to California to become a tennis pro as a teenager, only to realize once he got out there, that he wasn’t that good. He came home, started working in an office, went to the University of Toronto and eventually became an actuary, and a really good squash player. Trophies reveal that he won the Ontario Men’s Doubles Champion in 1967, and the over-50 category in 1981, among numerous other successes. Tom also has some amazing stories about meeting and playing against some of the pros.
He’ll also talk about his departed wife Norma, whom he loved very much, and I love to hear about the trips they took together using paper maps (crazy!) and staying at elder hostels across America. My job meant that I travelled to some interesting places, so when I’d say I was headed to the Bahamas, New Orleans or London, he’d tell me about his travels to those cities. When I went to Philadelphia last spring, he asked that I find the “best steakhouse” from his trip in the 1960s – I didn’t find it, but I did look.
Tom quickly became one of my favourite people. He still reads The Globe and Mail every day, but one day late. The news, he said, didn’t matter that much at his age, it was okay to be a day behind. The only thing he does look at every morning is the obituaries. “Phew, I’m not in there today,” he’ll joke but every so often, there is someone he knows, because he’s outlived a lot of his friends.
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Tom knows I enjoy the ballet, so any time there’s a story that’s dance related, he cut it out of the paper for me. He doesn’t fully understand what I do all day at work (I’m in marketing and e-commerce) but I can fix his computer.
In the spring of last year, my job situation changed. I no longer needed to be in the city weekly. The hardest part of the transition was telling Tom, because I knew he’d be disappointed. I, too, would miss our regular time together.
For me, Tom’s place was a place of friendship and connection. I still make trips to see him. And I want him to know he has a friend in me and I like to be reminded of a world that has less technology in it (Tom still uses a landline!). I want to hear the stories that bring him joy.
I also want Tom to be able to read about himself and be reminded that he’s made an impact on so many lives in his 96 trips around the sun. Human connections matter above all else. I’m so thankful for my friend Tom.
Becka Borody lives in Kitchener, Ont.