Menya saved my ass.

After 3 days of hell at Women's College Hospital, I was sent home, albeit prematurely. A home care nurse was supposed to show up the next morning.

Next morning, no nurse.

By noon, I was fed up. The hospital way giving me the runaround and I was getting pissed off.

I called Menya for help. Menya succinctly gave me the info I needed -- who to call and who to yell at. Without her I would have continued sitting there waiting for a nurse to arrive.

I thank the gods that Menya was a part of my network.

_Living Well_

Three women. Heather, Kristine and Menya.

Three women at a restaurant called the Living Well: Heather tending bar, Kristine and Menya sitting on barstools. They were having a conference about a _guy_, who shall remain nameless not because I choose to be circumspect but because I honestly can't remember his name as it was so long ago.

To Heather he had be the former friend. To Kristine he had been the former lover. To Menya he had been the former boyfriend.

Three women at the bar of the Living Well, enjoying a glorious night of conspiracy. The poor boy under discussion didn't stand a chance.

Some ten years have passed since that night three women spent at the Living Well. Menya left this world a few days ago.

She always did like living well.

Short, because this is on a meter:

Whenever I said "I'd like to....", Menya frequently responded "Well, why don't you....?"

Oftentimes, I'd realise I'd no good reason not to.

 Thank you Menya. For so much.
 Menya was a true friend ("...true friends help you move bodies - and don't ask any questions."), an inspiration ("Let's inspire him - he'd look very good on the pointy end of a spire"), a teacher ("If you can't find someone else to do it you can always teach-yer'self."), a helpmate ("Need some help, mate?" [OK, not a quote from Menya]), and so many other things - to so many people.
 I have so many happy memories of Menya [and not all of them involve fruit {forbidden or cloven}, or toes, or hairbrushes, or...].
 In fact, somehow she managed to make the sad times happy, if for no other reason than she was there to share in them.
 Thank you again.
 We will always love you.

Over the years Menya has never been far from my thoughts, although I hadn't seen her in over seven years. During my time in SCA, when she first joined, we were often
co-conspirisors on one political coup or another. Other times I was her target for them.

Menya had made an art of her innocent "who me?" look, a look that I will never forget.

You will be greatly missed.

I'm finding it very difficult to write about my feelings for Menya. I truly believe that without her caring and wisdom I would not have lived very long at all. It's been just over 3 years since I was told that I had cancer.

Like Menya, I have Inflammatory Breast Cancer (IBC)
 
Healthy people have no idea how freaky it feels being told one has a rare and potentially lethal disease. The IBC web site and support list Pete and Menya started has literally been a life saver for people all over the world with IBC. Comments come in all the time from list members saying that they wouldn't have been able to cope if it wasn't for the connections they have been able to make with other IBC people through the support list.

Not many people know the terror we feel knowing that we have IBC. One feels SO alone and it's of great comfort to finally find a place where there are others on the same path who understand the journey.

Menya and I talked often on the phone and I had the pleasure of actually meeting her and Pete twice. Once when they traveled to Ottawa and once when I was passing through Toronto on the way to visit my daughter. I'll miss her crazy laughter. Her incredible wit and wisdom will astound me forever. Those who knew her personally will understand my feelings of loss. Those who only knew her through cyber space will also understand. She touched us all. She had a heart so big.

She loved Pete with a passion and once told me that she was the luckiest woman on earth to have him for a soul mate.
I wish Pete the strength to cope with the loss of Menya. If it's of any help, there are hundreds of other people from the IBC support list who feel the same.

At a later date, when my heart is a little less sore, I will try to write some of the silly memories I have of Menya. We laughed together often.

Lee Smith
Ottawa

Edited by author 02-20-2001 09:45 PM
Hi this Sarah, I'm from the ibc list. I was diagnosed recently and although I never coresponded with Menya directly I could sense she was a woman of great warmth and life. I am indebted to her for starting the ibc list. Just to know I am not alone. Her strength and courage is inspiring. This is part of a song I wrote when I lost a dear friend that I would like to share with you. I don't know what else to say.
              I look to the light, I feel your embrace
               Brought to my knees, humbled in grace
             Will you stay for awhile, here by my side
              I speak of your love, I keep it alive
                          I keep it alive


Take care and god bless
Sarah

Dear Pete, Those of us on the BC list grew to love Menya from her first posts from England...and with her subsequent move to To...her posts were always informative..and lively ( smile) I always read them.....and enjoyed the latest........She will exist in our minds forever as a woman *with a future* who fought continuously against the breast cancer which constantly challenged her life....fortunately her posts are preserved in the archives for future readers.....I clicked on her web page very early on to see this woman..she was beautiful through and through...with my best regards to you ......jcs

I sometimes hold it half a sin
to put in words the grief I feel;
For words, like Nature, half reveal
and half conceal the Soul within.

But, for the unquiet heart and brain,
a use in measured language lies;
The sad mechanic exercise,
like dull narcotics, numbing pain.

In words, like weeds, I'll wrap me o'er,
like coarsest clothes against the cold;
But that large grief which these enfold
is given in outline and no more.

Menya, I will miss you. We shared wonderful times together, what seems forever ago when we were still free and confident and the world was young and bright.

I remember well how you and your friend Monica greeted me when I arrived at the SCA meeting that fall of 1983 - a couple of giddy girls you seemed to my oh-so-sophisticated graduate student self. I remember the Alice-in-Wonderland-dress and the closet party and extinguishing the Eternal Flame and many other wild adventures. You always will be that impish, wild, dangerous girl when I think of you.

I remember well sharing music with you - the Soldiers Three rehearsing in my room, or at the Pagan Palace, or just singing and playing together for the companionship of it. Though we often sang of drink and debauchery, I think you always loved the melancholy songs best, the laments and the dirges, the ballads of loss and sacrifice. You will always be that singer with sad eyes when I think of you.

I remember well sharing joy with you. You were the catalyst that brought my life and Monica's life together. Although we were going different ways when first we met, it was your constant friendship that kept bringing us together so that our own love could grow. You stood with us at our wedding, sharing the solemn and happy moment with us. And you still were the imp, who wormed out the secret get-away we had thought was totally secure. You will always be that laughing friend, co-conspirator and constant helper, when I think of you.

I remember well sharing trouble with you. When our son Michael was born and we had to learn to accept his disability, you were always there. You were there despite the thousands of miles that separated us, and you would call just to let us talk to you, to voice our fears, to help us carry our burden for a short time. And I remember when you called to share your burden with us, how you told us of your cancer and how suddenly we realized that we really had no burden at all. You will always be that generous caring sister when I think of you.

Menya, you lived with courage and dignity, with laughter and tears, with love, with generosity, and ultimately with acceptance. All these things you shared with us, and we are the richer for it.
Menya, you were and are and will be the best of friends.

I will miss you.

Oh, how I will miss Menya. We became friends at U of T and over the years I have taken for granted her presence in my world. She is someone with whom I have shared laughter and tears -- mostly laughter. I have said goodbye to Menya before, when she took off on a life journey to be with Pete. That journey brought her and Pete back here. And now my brave and courageous friend, has headed off on another life journey. Someday I will follow. Until then, her laughter will echo in my memory and she will live on in my heart. I love you Menya.

Brother Bill and I visited Menya at St. Mike's after a surgery there. Bill had left to pick up the Thai food and I was wheeling Menya around for some hospital "fresh air". We found, after what seemed like ages of asking staff who curiously didn't know where to direct us, the Chapel. In the Chapel, Menya sang. I had not heard her sing before. From Menya's lips came the most angelic sounds. The ease with which the tones came, and their beauty..... They filled the room and my heart. Afterwards, Pete and Bill played some very cute and entertaining game of peek-a-boo with an ancient statue in a foyer....

There's obviously not enough room here to say everything I want to say about Menya and Pete. So I will say this. It was fate that intervened through a very unusual series of circumstances that put me into Pete and Menya's world. I know they each felt very lucky to have each other. I feel doubly lucky to have known them both.

Menya has left for me an incredible gift. The gift of ultimate courage. No matter how dreadful or tedious the day I'm having, I have only to think of what Menya went through and how she handled her circumstances with such grace and dignity and positive action. Somehow, my day automatically gets better, especially when I recall the supercilious eyebrow that she could arch so well or the wicked laugh and rapier wit with which she used so effectively so often.

I will always treasure the quiet talks she and I had, about a wide range of subjects, from drug treatments to Shakespeare to religious morality, and I will always marvel at both she and Pete's ultimate courage in being able to ask their friends for help. It takes special people to be able to do this, and I was honoured to be allowed into their lives, in both good times and bad. To my soeur de saucisson, the Beatrice to my Benedict, I salute you, Menya----player of bridge and harp, lover of chocolate, and now, guardian angel. Keep the fires of Valhalla warm for the rest of us, for if ever anyone deserved to be in the hall of heroes, it is certainly you.

With all my love,

Mike

I'd just like to say that Menya was one of those special people who helped me through a bumpy patch of my life - I was able to dump my woes on a sympathetic ear which helped me greatly at the time. It's sad to lose such a lovely person but she will live on in my memory for her help and also via her lovely harp music. Thanks to those who helped make that available.

She also gave great back-rubs :-)

I spent a lot of time with Menya over the years. As a child, we visited frequently. As a pre-teen, she designed some seriously strange store windows for me. As a teenager, she was there to welcome me when I came home with my new baby. She was planning to "run" things for me while I coped with the little one. IT DIDN'T HAPPEN. I cooked and scrubbed and laundered. Menya cuddled. She sang spontaneous little baby songs and the bond was formed. In the years that followed, Menya came to our summer house with us, was child-tender extraordinaire, "keeper of the canoe key", resident artist, as well as inventor of rainy day games and strange kitchen concoctions. It was a delight to know I could just goof off because I didn't worry too much about cooking or scrubbing or laundry there. We just laughed and did very weird things -- an activity which suited her admirably.. She used to start those summer mornings with the ritual greeting of "Hello Ant" and insisted that I reply "Hello Nice". She had a high opinion of herself even then!

Watching her grow up was a pleasure. Her interests were so varied that she didn't seem to have any focus -- just a scattergun approach to life. Then one day everything clicked and came together and I think she rolled every funny little skill she had into one career. What a way to go through life -- be crazy and manage to make it work!

I'm sure going to miss you, kid -- and your wisecracks about all my musical shortcomings. Thank you for leaving a little of yourself with everyone who knew you -- and for the free babysitting all those years ago.

I met Menya in High School at Northern Secondary. She was a grade behind me but we were in the same choir class. An imp back then, she drove the music teacher crazy one April's Fools Day by taking all his white chalk and replacing it with coloured chalk, changing the colours throughout the day. She also wrapped the piano like a present.

She joined the SCA soon after I had, and we spent a lot of time singing together. In those early days, people sometimes confused our names, (just call us Menica and Monya), but that didn't last too long as she soon earned a place for herself.

I recall her mooning over a harp in the window of Remenyi Music, then making that trip to Ottawa to build her first harp with Naon. I remember her early attempt to drive during an SCA trip to Waterloo. I remember her pranks, slumber parties in her residence room, camping at Pennsic, singing and playing with Soldier's Three, and many interesting conversations as Phil and I courted, ("Life is a Shakespearean Comedy").

Menya, I am sorry we had to live so far away these last years. I am glad you found such a loving and caring husband in Pete. I am glad I did see you last fall, where despite your illness, you still maintained your wry sense of humour. I shall miss you,

Monica

I met Menya/Rhiannon through the SCA almost ten years ago. She helped me purchase my first harp, and I was always trying to get copies of her music. Unfortunately, she decided that her personna was illiterate, and would only teach the music by rote (which doesn't work well when you live in a different city). In the last year, having finally obtained copies of her lyrics, I was working with her to transcribe the actual music. The musical notation of her work can be found at:

http://www.bards.ca/sounds.htm

Currently, it is necessary to download a free program to view the pieces. I intend to add in midi or wav files at a later point in time.

If anyone knows of any additional pieces which she wrote, please contact me at: tablet@interlog.com

Robert Schweitzer
aka Rufus of Stamford