Read Margaret Louise Scovil Wade (nee Neales)'s Obituary & Leave Condolences

In memory of

Margaret Louise Scovil Wade (nee Neales)

Ottawa, ON, Canada

October 4, 1925 - May 1, 2020

Oct 4, 1925 - May 1, 2020

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On Friday May 1, 2020, as the fiddleheads emerged for their first licks of spring light, Margaret Louise Scovil Wade (nee Neales) passed on to the next life swept into the arms of her beloved George Glendon Wade (d.2016). Sharp to the end with beautifully sinister humour and a heart brimming with compassion. She always said she was being selfish in her final years, but it was nowhere ever to be seen by anyone. She cared more to ask questions about people and worried about her family and those closest to her. There was a warmth about her, something in the way she pulled you in and held on for a hug, or rubbed your back just sitting with you for a moment. There was a spark in her eye that only grew with her. She was thrilled every time a visitor dropped in, a host to the very end. Louise would never want to put anyone out of their way, but what she never understood was that she drew us in. We were all there because of her. We wanted to be around her. We wanted to be more like her.

It is said that on a Sunday at dawn in Fredericton the church bells rang loudly and hung long in the air, proclaiming the arrival of Louise. Born on Sunday, October 4, 1925 to loving parents Frances Isobell White (d.1967) and William Sterling Neales (d.1965), she finalized a neat family of five as the younger sister to doting protectors Charles Scovil Neales (d.1973) and William (Bill) Hazel Scovil Neales (d.1977). She grew up in a postwar, post Spanish flu household, and came of age through the 1930s depression era. Like much of her generation, these early struggles primed her for a life of diligent saving and conservation. Louise soaked up a love for cards and games from her father, an engineer by trade, along with a fierce and ruthless competitiveness and an eye for detail. She was an incurable cheat at all games, and given half a chance would steal your points or knock your player off the board with glee. Her mother was a fiery sort and a straight-shooter with a flare for hosting. Louise was forged as a great balance of her parents: smart, sharp, and fun, but never one to be taken advantage of.

Friendships she built during her time at Oromocto through Fredericton High School were nurtured and maintained for a lifetime. Her group of friends, including her brothers Scovil and Bill, and sister-in-law Iris, were very close and did everything together. They may well have been restaurant and food bloggers before that was popularized years later, often all cramming into a car or two to drive to neighbouring towns and communities to try new restaurants and cuisine. No matter where she moved in the years to come there was always a nearby connection to her roots out east. These relationships were strong, so much so that following his return from Europe she decided to keep one around, marrying her longtime friend and sweetheart Glen on March 6, 1947.

Glen’s military career would keep the couple moving as they began their family, welcoming daughters in different cities: Sally Evelyn Frances in Fredericton, 1953; Patricia (Trish) Anne Patenaude (d.2016) in Toronto, 1954; and finally her namesake Margaret (Peggy) Louise in Sept-Isles in 1959. During these years Louise’s parents would often convoy the girls back to New Brunswick for parts of the summer holidays, immersing them in her rich east coast family history.

Having moved around for much of the 1950s, Glen and Louise found their way to Ottawa in 1964 where they'd raise their children and settle in for the next 30 years. Seventeen Twenty-four Grasmere Crescent became a hub of activity for their friends, family, and eventually their daughters' friends. With her gardening flare and love of colours, she coaxed the best out of perennials, annuals, and, in particular, pansies to create flower beds in the front yard with stunning curb appeal. Around back, her practical nature crept in with an extensive vegetable bed where summer meals were highlighted by her home grown delights. Louise was an avid canner, and would prepare produce, pickles, apple sauce, jams, and so much more for our long and cold Canadian winters. Her love of canning would span generations and influence her children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren as she relished every opportunity to teach her craft, although vocally against her granddaughter’s experimental jalapeno strawberry jam. One of her favourite past-times was fiddleheading, and she would take growing generations on long hunts through bogs and marshes, crossing fallen trees over ravines, ignoring gnats and mosquitos and all of the biting flies in search of her prized greens. Louise taught her daughters to cook, and then stood back to watch what she’d unleashed as Sally tricked Trish into eating chicken fat by telling her it was honey, Trish fumigated the house in a science experiment gone wrong, and Peggy attempted to sterilize dirt by baking it. Grasmere is where she saw them date, go off to school, and eventually start families of their own. And after two decades of girls, Charles (Chuck) Joseph MacInnis, Joseph Ferdinand Michel (Mike) Patenaude (d.1996), and Michael (Mike) Terrance Johnston (d.2020) would become the sons that she never had, and perfect targets for her evolving repertoire of pranks. Confetti became a personal favourite - Chuck never did manage to clean it all out of his car vents.

Louise was a natural as a grandmother and used a large stable of grandchildren to really hone her skills. Glen and Louise marked the start of their grandparenthood around the same time the upstart Blue Jays entered the American League, a club that she would religiously follow the rest of her life. Over the following 14 years Sally, Trish, and Peggy would bring 12 babies into the fold (Matthew, Mark, Alexander, Meaghan, Patrick, Kathryn; Andrew, Nicholas; James, Eric, Colleen, Elizabeth). She was a wizard in the kitchen and they all clung to her every move as she taught them a trick or two, including molasses cookies, maritime brown bread, the art of Aunt Ada’s chocolate icing, and, perhaps most importantly, those perfectly golden circular pancakes. She taught her grandchildren that if you step on a tarline crack you’ll be stuck there forever, and that if you flush the toilet at night you have to be fast back to bed, lest the polar bears catch and eat you. Birthdays were an especially good time to get ‘bumps’ and, if you weren’t careful, a glob of butter on the nose. And perhaps she just liked having candy and chocolate around, but there was never a shortage of Gram’s ‘hurt medicine’ on hand to fix all of the deep emotional wounds from lightly skinning one's knee.

Often people don’t live long enough to watch their grandchildren grow to adulthood, let alone experience the delights of seeing yet another generation of children blossom. During her last 11 years, Louise adored her great grandchildren, finding inner wells of childish energy to join in the fun with Madeleine, Francis, Eleanor, Alexis, Jack, Hunter, Finley, Isabella and Miguel. Eleanor, testing the limits of these reserves, favoured jumping onto Louise’s walker and expecting a woman 90 years her senior to push her as though in a go-kart. Louise loved every moment of it.

Although quite a formal affair early on, meals took on a lighter tone over the years, as Louise’s playful nature and competitive edge would send her seeking-fork out to explore and pillage from the plates of often quite suspecting family. It was a venture in defence as one builds a strategy to protect one's food and particularly the icing on one’s cake from her assault. She was nearly stabbed in the hand with a defensive fork maneuver conducted by an audacious grandson who valued his mashed potatoes over his grandmother's functioning metacarpals. Sitting beside her at dinner, you knew what to expect, and usually it involved less food than you served for yourself.

Louise was an insatiable sports fanatic, following everything from NASCAR to curling, and especially her beloved Blue Jays and Ottawa Senators. Most times you would call her she’d be balancing a few games on different networks just to keep up. Gametime was often a target for her grandchildren to call in, especially after the Leafs played the Senators, when Louise would be extra salty from the loss. Proving you can teach an old dog new tricks, in her 10th decade, Louise began loving and obsessing over all things Toronto Raptors, and would stay up late into the night to watch west coast prime time games, culminating in the excitement of course last year when they won the whole league. Louise was there every step. She didn't like to reminisce much, Louise stayed in the present and looked to tomorrow. Speaking with her left you refreshed and it seemed to energize her also. Now that she’s gone there are still outstanding questions and unfinished conversations. It's hard to believe that after 94 years there can still be boxes left to check.

Louise spent so much of her life sacrificing for others, it was beautiful to see her take some time for herself in what was her final four years. She was the matriarch and somewhat of a celebrity in her family. While at Orchard Walk (formerly Orchard View), Louise would hold court with visitors and friends, getting out to her garden plot as often as she could. She found ways to stimulate her mischievous side, deking through the service entrance past the kitchen, rather than the standard route to sneak out to her garden. Occasionally, she would be caught pushing friends around in wheelchairs through the hallways and foyer. Her karting aspirations didn't sit well with the medical staff, but popular opinion didn't hold her back; she did it her way...with a big heart and little extra salt ;)

Left to choose, she would lean toward making new memories rather than talk about past exploits. As such, there are pieces that she takes with her that will simply fade into legend. As legacy goes, the torch now passed to all her future generations to carry. Somewhere, in an unmarked, inaccessible marsh, the fiddleheads break free, kissing the new spring air to the distant bells ringing through her exit song, for the first time without our Louise.

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