From time to time he wistfully claims he has every intention of returning to painting. It has been over a decade since he picked up his brushes. There are started canvasses downstairs in his studio that he has simply set aside. He's been busy with numerous other projects. It was exciting in a sense when he was involved in painting; the slow revelation of the scene that he was busy with coming into focus, and the final completion of the painting. He hardly considers himself what might be termed a skilled artist, but he finds pleasure and satisfaction in it.

For my part, I'm amazed that he has that talent. It's one that our children appear to have inherited. It's not just painting, but all manner of crafts and even scholarly things; his immense interest in history and in world literature, in art and in the accomplished creation of objects of great beauty. Through woodworking, and the production of stained glass windows, for example. No job seems too difficult or too large for him to tackle when he is inspired to begin it. Not excavating large areas around the house to prepare them for the laying of brickwork in an ornamental courtyard, nor installing a wood-lined library on our second floor. Neither plumbing nor electrical work fazes him; he tackles it all.

At this point in our lives, however, I would most particularly like him to return to painting. He took up watercolour sketches around fifty years ago. He would take our then-youngest child in a stroller accompanied by a friend also interested in art, with his own young child also in a stroller and they would go to the Art Gallery of Ontario together.

Over succeeding years when we used to take our children on outdoor recreational adventures; hiking, canoeing, mountain climbing he would do sketches and later translate some of them into paintings. And when he travelled for his work he would often return home with sketches of what he had seen and thought likely for a painting, in good time. In a way some of those paintings represent a chronicle of our lives unfolding. Apart from the pleasure they provide us with in enjoying them.