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December 15, 1922 - July 11, 2001 .  Friends and family, My name is Phil and I am a "nephew" of Phyllis Voigt whose life we are celebrating today. I am also the son of Dorothy Bartle, who is the cousin of Phyllis, and her closest friend over a span touching eight decades; Phyllis Piper and Dorothy Piper. I am also up here on behalf of my mother to remember Phyllis. All of us have memories of Phyllis, and they are not all the same. I won't try to list a comprehensive set of anecdotes, but bring a few to memory over her life. Picture three little girls, aged eight nine and ten. It was Mothers' Day and they wanted to bring some flowers home to their Moms. They saw some lovely tulips outside the Institute for the Blind in Vancouver; and each gathered a few to give to their mothers. When asked where they got them, Phyllis replied, "Oh, it is all right. The people were all blind so they could not see them." Phyllis has roots here in the Cowichan Valley, and Dorothy remembers that she often traveled to Vancouver Island for visits. Her dad, Harry Piper, before he became an electrician, was a logger on the Island. When she was born, she made history of sorts by being the first child christened in Paldie. Phyllis' mother, Auntie Lulu, used to take the girls for swimming lessons sponsored by the Vancouver Sun, every Saturday morning. You can imagine the hi-jinks and fun those high spirited girls had. And Phyllis took piano lessons. She loved the piano - and she loved music. For many years we in the Bartle family kept her piano for her until she was able to settle down in a house long enough to take it back. I took piano lessons, but did not do so well; we stopped them after the third lesson. None of us had much money in those days. I still recall how graceful Auntie Phyllis became in front of the piano, her hands flying over the keys like forest birds. Phyllis and George were rather peripatetic, and I remember, as a child, visiting them in many places throughout the lower mainland - from urban apartments to rural cabins; that is why we kept her piano. Always there was music, as my father accompanied Phyllis, playing banjo, guitar, ukulele or mouth organ while she played the piano. Lots of music and song. Later they moved to Peace River, Alberta, then to Edmonton. There she showed that she could take a practical joke when George and their friend, Jeep, were late, phoned her in the middle of the night, and said they had been arrested, by the police; would she please come down town and bring bail money. She hurriedly dressed and went into down town Peace River, and found that they had played a trick on her. Next morning Jeep and George found that their coffee tasted awfully salty. In Peace River, where I spent the summer of my twelfth year, she dressed me up as a girl and introduced me to her neighbours as her "niece." When I was in school, I failed music, but the teachers passed me with a sympathy grade. I had no idea about pitch or melody. When a teacher would say sing higher, I stood up on my toes. Then, when our family went on a summer camping trip, we stopped a few days with the Voigts in Edmonton. I was about fifteen. Auntie Phyllis had a ukulele, and she taught me the two chords on it that belonged to the song, "Tom Dooley." It was pretty awful to hear me painfully repeating them. But when I got home I asked my dad to show me the same chords on the guitar; from that, and the enthusiasm instilled in me by Phyllis, I learned about music, learned how to play guitar and sax, and formed my own dance band. By the way, that was the trip where my brother, David, and her youngest daughter, Georgina, decided to go swimming in the huge mud puddle in the back yard. Well they were pre-school at the time. Never phased Phyllis at all; she laughed, cleaned them off, threw the clothes in the washing machine, and added the anecdote to the hundreds of stories she could tell. Phyllis was like a "Big Momma" of the frontier. She entertained, as her husband and children brought home so many friends. The City of Edmonton presented her with their 1965 Hospitality Award for entertaining so many people. "Come on in," she would say to unexpected visitors, "We'll add a bit more water to the soup." Her children remember lots of fried chicken, lots of laughs and lots of visitors. That year the house went for several months with never less than ten persons sitting down to each meal. And there were always stories and tall tales, Phyllis could spin a yarn with the best of them. She never put herself in the centre of attention, but supported and built up all those around her. There were always lots of laughs and lots of noise around her. The sounds of love. Two favourite games of Phyllis were Scrabble and Bingo. She introduced the game of Scrabble to me in Peace River, but I could never beat her; it sure helped me with my vocabulary years later at university, When they moved into Crofton, she organised the Bingo games there for the old age pensioners. When Auntie Phyllis had to move into Cowichan Lodge, before the disease she fought became too much, she entertained the seniors there with her piano playing, her story telling, and bingo. From her childhood onwards, she was always ready for an adventure, ready to try anything at least once. About six years ago, one of her daughters, who shall remain anonymous, in Kosemal, Mexico, suggested they go skinny dipping, and she was ready in a minute. Well, ... she wore a hat to keep the sun off. I have been collecting stories of her life these last few days, and there are just too many to repeat here. We will do her the hour of respecting her if we continue to pass these stories on to those around us. For her, along with the cooking huge dinners and sending us to heaven with her piano playing, these were the ways she expressed her love of us, and her love of life. God bless you Auntie Phyllis
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