Halifax, NS
September 13, 1945 - June 29, 2024
Picture it. New Glasgow, Nova Scotia, September 9, 1945 (said in the voice of another small but mighty spitfire-of-a-woman, Sophia Petrillo, from The Golden Girls). World War II had finally ended. Twenty-nine-year-old nurse Roberta MacDonald, nine months pregnant with her first child, arrived at the hospital for an x-ray (yes, an x-ray!) and was admitted to give birth. She endured a long and brutal labor that almost killed her. She would later share that she should have had a C-section, but the doctor was busy elsewhere performing an amputation, so that window of opportunity opened and closed!
Four days later, on September 13, 1945, at 2pm, Helen Anne MacDonald was pulled out with forceps (“that big MacDonald head!”), weighing in at 6 pounds, 7 ounces. Small but mighty right from the start, she would be known as Anne (with an “e”), even though she spent the rest of her life, especially her final year, telling people repeatedly that she was NOT Helen!
Her father James, a farmer, was managing a farm in Wickham, New Brunswick at the time of her birth, so was not present. Over a month later, Roberta traveled by train and ferry with her sister Priscilla, to Wickham to be reunited with her husband and introduce him to his daughter. Anne’s father saw her for the first time in the moonlight.
Two years later, the family farmhouse in Sylvester burned to the ground, so James, Roberta and Anne returned home to Nova Scotia. James and Roberta built a small farmhouse on top of the old cellar of the house that burnt. It was on this 150-acre “mixed farm” where Anne grew up. Although the farm made very little money, she never felt like her family was poor. There was always food on the table (her mother was an amazing cook and baker) and lots of extended family lived nearby.
When she was four, the teacher of the one room school in Sylvester reached out to Anne’s parents to ask if they would consider sending her to school a year early. A girl named Irene MacPhail was going to be the only one in Primary and the teacher thought it would be good for her to have a companion. So began Anne’s school career. She would walk to and from school, which was a mile away, on what was then the main road between Pictou and New Glasgow. Cars and big trucks whizzing by. No sidewalks except a narrow patch of dirt between the road and the ditch! The only time she can recall getting a drive was when her mother picked her up from school in a tractor because there was a runaway horse in the area!
By the time Anne was just 11, she was already in grade 7, having been put ahead another year in school because she was so bright. It was at this tender age that she was faced with a decision that would ultimately change her life forever. Since the one room school she attended only went to grade 7, Anne had to decide where she would go to finish out her schooling: New Glasgow or Stellarton Junior High. For Anne, the decision was an easy one. Every summer, her family took her to watch baseball games in Stellarton. The Stellarton Albions’ roster was packed with young, virile American college boys! In Anne’s eyes, they were the next best thing to Elvis. Stellarton Junior High it would be!
Irene McPhail, mentioned before and Anne’s classmate at the one-room school, followed her to Stellarton too. When Irene was in grade 10, she started dating a boy named Pete Marcott. And Pete just happened to have a best friend named Brady Copeland. The rest, as they say, is history.
Anne was part of the second-ever graduating class of the newly-opened West Pictou District High in 1964. She graduated at the ripe old age of 16 and went on to complete a two-year program at the Nova Scotia Teachers College in Truro. By the time she was 18, Anne was teaching at a two-room school in Alma, grades 4 to 7, barely older (and definitely shorter!) than some of her students. One of Anne’s proudest accomplishments was eventually obtaining her Bachelor of Arts, Major in English and Minor in Sociology, and a Bachelor of Education from Saint Francis Xavier University in 1995, while also still teaching full time. Truth be told, we suspect she did this just to get the coveted “X ring”, which she wore proudly for the rest of her life.
Married in July 1965, Anne and Brady had three daughters, Leah, Kelly and Christena. Anne’s happiest years were raising her daughters. Those years were filled with lots of extracurricular activities (swimming, singing, piano, skating lessons), family trips to England, Scotland, Germany, Florida, Bermuda, and more. But the best memories are the ones she created for her family in the less obvious, quieter moments. Warm milk in Santa mugs on Christmas Eve. Breakfast every morning and drives with her to school. Sloppy Joes. Lying in her bed watching The Thorn Birds. Fighting over who would sit next to her in the front seat of the car. Lazy cake. Sneaking up to watch Dallas on a Friday night. Family walks to the apple tree. Bedtime stories. Cheese sauce on toast. Planting flowers in the spring. Christmas Log. Playing fairies on the front lawn as she and our dad sipped coffee on woven plastic lawn chairs on the front step. Welcoming friends and boyfriends and eventually husbands into our home. Board games and cards at the kitchen table. Birthdays and homemade cakes and presents that always made you feel so special and loved.
Anne retired from teaching in 2001 and this was also the same year that she started a new life and adventure in Halifax. Although recollections may vary, it was also on or around this time that Anne met the true love of her life, a younger man by the name of John Francis Bongiovi Jr. You might know him by his “professional” name - Jon Bon Jovi. Anne would go on to attend eight of her boyfriend’s concerts in total over the years, starting in 2010!
Always young at heart, Anne would also attend concerts by the Rolling Stones (three times), Rod Stewart (twice), Bryan Adams (four times), Anne Murray (twice), Paul McCartney, Billy Joel, U2, Dixie Chicks, k.d. Lang, Leonard Cohen, Celine Dion, Sara Brightman and Def Leppard.
She never rested on her laurels. Always interested and interesting, she never stopped learning, growing and traveling, whether it was signing up for the latest SCANS class (Seniors’ College Association of Nova Scotia), jumping on a plane to visit her brother Kenny in Nashville or to Japan to visit her cousin, Deb or jetting off with her friend Sandra to tour Italy, Switzerland, France and England.
Anne didn’t think she was special or extraordinary. She always said that her own mother was “nicer than me.” She was so wrong. She thought of herself as shy, but her presence was big. Her opinions were strong but not rigid. Her chatter was exuberant and never-ending, but she was still the most interested in you, what was going on in your life, what your story was, where you came from, how you were doing. Her mother told her that if she wanted to be liked by people, she should ask them questions about themselves instead of talking about herself.
“If you want to be thought of as a brilliant conversationalist, let the other person do most of the talking,” her mother advised. It was something Anne took to heart, even during the last year of her life, when she was so sick and at her worst. She loved getting to know those who were caring for her, forever asking the nurses, doctors, and cleaning staff questions about their lives outside of the hospital. “Everyone has a story,” she would say.
She loved Coronation Street, Britbox, CBC News, the laughable drama of David Muir on ABC World News Tonight, the gals on The View (although “Whoopi can be a bit much”), Live with Kelly & Mark (and of course DVR’ing them was a must, so she could fast forward the commercials!).
She loved her coffee and peanut butter on English muffins in the morning, sitting at her kitchen counter in her pj’s with the Chronicle Herald and the daily crossword puzzle. She loved playing Words with Friends with her cousin Deborah in Japan (“even though I almost always lose!”). She loved an invitation to supper. She loved candy cane ice cream. She loved lipstick. “Never go anywhere without your lipstick!” her mother told her. And so she never did - not to the mailroom in her apartment lobby and not to get a CT scan at the hospital, even when she could no longer get out of bed. She loved turkey dinner and all the fixings (and this was the set menu for Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter and God help you if you ever suggested otherwise - not that anyone would!). She loved getting comments on her Facebook posts. She loved her iPad and iPhone - her lifelines to the outside world and her instruments of choice for sending the longest, most detailed-oriented, most rambling texts ever (oh, what we wouldn’t give to receive one of her never-ending text threads right now). She loved hanging out with her three grandsons (even though she initially proclaimed she didn’t know what to do with boys, after raising three girls, she stepped up so beautifully). And of course, she loved spending time with her daughters.
Novelist Toni Morrison once said, “When your child walks into the room, do your eyes light up?” This was one of the greatest gifts Anne gave her daughters. Her joyful face was the first thing we always saw, whether it was returning home for the weekend from university, coming through the sliding glass doors at the airport, walking into her apartment or even her hospital room at the end. We always felt like the most loved, most cherished, most valued, and like the most important person in any room our mother was in. Our mother’s love changed our lives and allowed us to spread our wings, always knowing we had a safe place to return to and land. She was always the first person we called when we had good news or bad. And she was always there without question or hesitation. Strong and unselfish. Quirky and steadfast. Sarcastic and sweet. Irreplaceable. Home was always where our mother was: The house on the hill in Sylvester. Walter Havel or Washmill Lake Drive. Room 113, 84 or 100 at the VG.
Anne is survived by her daughters Leah (Rory), Kelly (Ian), and Christena (Kurt); grandsons Brady and Connor Gibson and Finley Thompson; former spouse and forever family, Brady (Kathy) Copeland; brother Doug (Liz) MacDonald, and the many children she looked after in Halifax following her retirement, who also called her “Nanna”: Taylor, Jorja, Dawson, Kingston, Ginger, Olivia, Lauren, Jack, Rachel, Jenna, Erin, Charlie, Lauren, and Joseph.
She was predeceased by her parents, James and Roberta (Archibald) MacDonald and brother, Kenny (Elmer) MacDonald.
Celebration of life to take place on October 19, 2:00pm at Snow’s Funeral Home on Lacewood Drive, Halifax.
To the staff on 8A of the Victoria General Hospital, you have our undying gratitude and love for the care you provided for our mother in the last year of her life, as she so courageously and valiantly fought Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma. We want to especially thank our mother’s own angel on Earth, Jeffrey Bautista, for always going above and beyond, making our mother feel seen, and for making her laugh during the worst situations and circumstances; Kat and Brittany, for the tough love and for never giving up on her; Otis and Prince; and to Paula, who saw us through the final, hardest night of our lives with such professionalism, skill, and grace.
Mommy, we know you’ll be busy getting caught up with Grammie and Grampa and being dragged along on new, crazy adventures with Kenny (because he can never sit still!), but we hope you’ll find time to show us you’re still out there and still looking out for us. We’ll be watching for those lights to come on - and any sign you decide to send us. We’ll spend the rest of our lives missing you and trying to figure out how to do this life without you. You were the best mother. When we feel like crying, we’ll hear your words in our head, “Might as well laugh as cry!” ;-)
Until we meet again.
We love you, Mommy.
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