Time: 6:30 p.m.
Cover: none
Floyd Sillito will be playing country music. Floyd Sillito (By Otto Pahl from http://all-that-to-say.com/)
Henry David Thoreau once stated that “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation”.
My friend Floyd though, is not to be found in that group.
As a young boy, I heard Floyd’s voice several times. On Friday evenings, my older brothers would tune in to CFCN Radio, Calgary to listen to the music of the Old Timers Dance Band. Floyd was a member of this band and would often sing a vocal number during the show. His country and western songs were an enjoyable addition to the instrumental dance tunes played by the band.
I met Floyd in person a few decades later at a birthday party, and we have been friends ever since. Our shared interest in music resulted in several public appearances with his band, including a performance at Olds College 70th anniversary celebration in 1983.
During that time he was busy enjoying success in his music adventures and happiness in his personal life, when the earth suddenly shifted and nothing was ever the same again. On an ordinary day at the end of June in 1985, a tragic vehicle accident left Floyd’s wife in a coma for a long time before she finally slipped away.
I cannot imagine how devastating that must have been. How does one keep going after a blow like that? And yet, he did.
Choices and circumstances following that event caused our paths to diverge, and visits, while always enjoyable, occurred infrequently. Then to our delight, this spring he asked Karen and me to join him for a series of concerts in Southern Alberta.
While the hands of time have stripped youth from his body, they have not been able to diminish his spirit. With many decades as a musician behind him, he is still actively entertaining the crowds at various locations in the province. It was a treat to see him in action and to be able to participate with our own musical offerings. The positive and enthusiastic reactions of the audiences, who obviously love him, never failed to enhance our feelings of satisfaction as we shared music with them.
During this series of performances, we stayed in the guest suite at the Seniors Lodge, where Floyd has lived for the past 13 years. Even in the everyday acts of living in this environment, his interactions with his fellow travellers in this place were a treat to observe.
The poem, “Courage”, by Helen Brazee Bower contains these lines:
[we] came where fire had worked untimely death;
The woods were gone. But on a slender stalk
A flower inched for life. I caught my breath.
“Courage,” I said and took you by the hand,
“Is one white flower in a fire-swept land.”
It is probably true that the elderly experience more loneliness and despondency than any other age group. Spouses, siblings, and friends may have passed on and their children, even if residing nearby, are busy with their own families. As living on their own becomes unmanageable they are often required to move from their homes into communal environments. No matter how beautiful the place, or how attentive the care, life can certainly be a “fire-swept land” where “the woods are gone.” To keep living with joy, a positive outlook and a giving spirit would require extreme courage, indeed.
My friend definitely has that; he is a role model to be admired.
Thoreau’s words at the beginning of this blog are often misquoted in a way that I believe gives them additional significance. “Most men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them.”
Not Floyd.
All that to say…
I will take every opportunity to be exposed to his kind of courage and optimism. It’s contagious.
