Remembering Deb
All through the month of February, I’ve been thinking back to last February when the world lost Debbie Knox.
Deb, with her children, at a Kingston Frontenacs game.
I met Deb when she was still Deb Greenwood. When we were on the island she cut my hair, she cut my sons’ hair, and she did my hair for my wedding.
Deb was the kind of person you wanted to have doing your hair for your wedding, because she always talked just enough, and never too much, and she was always bubbly and positive, but with an edge of funny, too. Like she saw the failings in the world but chose to tackle them with humour and happiness.
Which is why it’s just so frickin’ cruel that the thing she had to face wasn’t one that could be overcome with humour and happiness. Deb was assaulted by cancer. There’s no other way to describe it. I have never known anyone else to have so much thrown at her – to take so many steps forward, only to confront another step back. And another. And another.
But, in a way, her humour and happiness did triumph, because even in the face of everything she went through, that’s how so many people remember her.
Going back to my wedding day, I didn’t get married until four o’clock. Which meant I was able to go for a run in the morning, along all the same roads Meg runs along in Appaloosa Summer, and Wednesday Riders. Then my mom, my mother-in-law, my two sisters-in-law, and myself sat in the big kitchen / family room of my parents’ house, looking out over the St. Lawrence, and Deb did our hair.
It was relaxing, it was comfortable, and it was fun. And she did a great job …
I showed her a picture from a magazine – that’s all – just one picture, and she ran with it. This was the result:
Dancing with my dad – wedding hair from the front!
I really loved my hair that day, which was so important because it was one less thing to worry about.
The back of my wedding hair. Can’t decide if my husband looks terrified or happy … we were so young!
As a final note, Deb used SO MANY bobbypins, I kept finding them for days. I’m sure the maid who did our bed in the B&B where we stayed on our wedding night, must have found dozens of them in the sheets.
That’s it, that’s all, a small tribute to Deb. I hope it’s fitting. To me she was always a person who made everybody’s life better one day at a time, so maybe a small tribute is appropriate.
I wish all the best to her family.
