Peter
Feniak met
Wayne Tefs at the U of M in the 1970s, when they were both studying English. As
can happen with those encounters, they formed a life-long friendship that only
ended with the death of Wayne Tefs in 2014. Kristen Wittman came to know Peter
through Wayne, to whom she was married for close to 20 years before he died,
and it is her relationship with Wayne, and the grief over his death, that
inspired Death Becomes Us, Kristen’s second volume of poetry being
released by Turnstone Press spring 2021. Peter and Kristen exchange thoughts in
conversation on the topic of life, love, cancer, death, and Wayne Tefs.
As you know, Wayne was diagnosed with cancer in December, 1994, and passed away in September 2014. We had a lot of time to face the fact that he was going to die. I had the … struggling for a word here – privilege? luxury? – to have him accompany me through the grieving process. Literally, he held my hand during the final stretch of his life, comforting me, all the while he was dying. It was incredibly unselfish of him. He let me talk to him about the pain I was experiencing. We both knew he was experiencing pain – I continue to wonder how he could hold all of it in, and get up every day and get so much accomplished. Did I mention he was driven? He had a heart attack in March 2014 – we assumed it was the cancer progressing, causing pain in his arm, but no, it was a heart attack – and a week after he was out of the hospital he was up on his stationary bike, exercising.
We also knew that it would not be long, once he started to deteriorate. We were in a peer group for carcinoid (an amazing group – CNets) and saw how quickly others went from seemingly good health to death. So we knew, by July, that he wasn’t probably going to survive another winter. I took a lot of time off in August and we spent the days slowly, quietly, looking after each other. I rose early in the mornings and left him sleeping, and went for a bike ride, 50, 70, sometimes 100 kilometres, rode hard to numb my brain. Then home, I’d bring a coffee and some scrambled eggs to the bedside, and he’d eat, and we’d drink coffee and plan the day. Those days remain precious to me. The hardest part of his absence for me was losing those conversations.
I thought, in the years leading up to his death, that my work (as you know, I’m a partner in a law firm, where I’ve developed client relationships, some of which span 25 years) would be what carried me, sustained me, after he died. You are correct when you say nobody knows – I was so completely wrong in my anticipation. Instead of work being my focus, it became my friends and, bizarrely to me, my house. Our house. I suppose that shouldn’t come as a surprise but we’d spent 20 years trying to get away from the house – travelling far away at every opportunity. There was no “staycation” during our marriage. Of course my friends became of importance to me, but I was truly surprised that the house took on so much meaning. That was a shocker. And my work was, well, it was what it had always been, no more or less.
As far as finding a way forward – anyone who has had a loss in their lives knows that a way forward comes, whether you find it or it finds you. But I would be remiss if I didn’t mention two people who stood by, closely, within reach, to help me focus on that path – Jodi who flew into Winnipeg the day Wayne died and handled everything and took me out for supper that night and then to her cottage in Kenora for a week of contemplation and kayaks; and Lisa, who shouldered her own loss years earlier, who came and spent a week with me in October when we launched Barker (posthumously published by Turnstone Press). For me, anyway, the quiet company they each provided granted me the strength I needed to carry on.
— humans are complex, humans with great talent and drive perhaps even more so — how did you connect with Wayne?, how much was fun and how much was not? and what did the 'cancer journey' teach you and him?
I think our connection was the intensity, which of course is a double-edged sword. We took each other too seriously, much of the time. I sometimes wonder if living with a life-ending diagnosis was inevitable for him, because of how seriously he took everything. Or was it the other way around? He became more and more serious, as his death became a greater reality. How could one not? I recall chatting with a former colleague of Wayne’s after he passed away, someone with whom I also developed a friendship, and he said that he thought Wayne and I just fit together. I suspect that’s because we were quite similar, and were able to tease each other a bit about features that we could spot in each other, that we shared. Too serious, too competitive, too intense. Racing each other up a long climb in France on our bicycles, I remember gasping for air at the top of the climb, being out of breath from laughing so hard. We were so determined to reach the peak first, we went flying past some poor fellow grinding his way along on his mountain bike, who was so startled at our intensity that it made me laugh, and I couldn’t breathe and laugh at the same time, and had to give in. (Side note: little lighter cyclists make for better climbers – Wayne carried an extra 60 pounds up those hills, so I was often out ahead – he spent the rest of his life recalling that victory.)
We travelled a ton. I’m sure everyone who has faced a diagnosis makes promises to change their lives or not take any day for granted, but of course it is impossible, particularly over 20 years, to “face the wide glare of the children’s day” every day (to misquote Robert Graves). Our pledge to each other, while in Mexico in 1997, was to travel as much as we could afford, in money, time, and health. We fell in love with cycling holidays, France, England, Italy, the Maritimes; we visited Mexico every winter until his health no longer supported travelling to that climate. I joked the other day that I’ve probably seen more of France than most French people. And we discovered the Mid-West, Wisconsin, Minnesota, when his health further reduced our overseas journeys. Our final trip to Europe, in 2013, was to the Alps, and particularly to Alpe D’Huez, a cycling mecca. We rode up the 21 switchbacks slowly, very slowly, as Wayne struggled with the climbing. But he made it to the top, and sat staring out at the parking lot where we stopped with blood-shot eyes. It was incredible to watch his determination. He achieved, in the year before he died, a feat that most people can’t even fathom – to climb Alpe D’Huez on a bicycle. It sometimes felt like I was just along for the ride.
But even with the days’ demands, we ensured we took time to be together. Every morning, without fail, we got up and made our way to Starbucks, and each had a latte. We rode there in the summer, sometimes walked in the winter, sometimes drove. I firmly believe that the best thing two people can do for their relationship (whatever the relationship) is to maintain consistency. That was ours – every morning, we took that time to sit and sip our coffees and chat. We went to Starbucks because it forced us to spend the time together – at home it would be too easy to turn on the TV to catch the news, or turn on the computer to check emails. This way, our focus was each other. Even if only for 15 minutes. Every day, until the last two weeks of his life.
__ how does this very special man live in your life today, now that you have a renewed life?
Ah, the discretion! Before Wayne died, he did two things: he asked his son for permission to die (they had a very good talk, from what I understand); and he gave me specific permission to find someone, to fall in love again. He said he knew me better than I new myself (which is no doubt true) and I was not the sort of person to face life alone. And he was right; I knew Dave (he was in-house counsel with a client of mine), having met him earlier in 2014, and when he followed up with a phone call in the fall of that year to inquire on Wayne’s health, he asked if I would mind if he called again sometime. It was an innocuous request, and I enjoyed chatting with him, and over the next few months the idle chit-chat of the long- distance phone call blossomed into what is now a deep and meaningful relationship. It was too soon: everyone told me to do nothing for one year, no matter what. But I never listen. I was incredibly happy and incredibly sad all the time. You can go mad that way. The sadness eased, the happiness remains, and not a day goes by when I don’t think of Wayne, and I thank him for giving me that permission. I know a widow who says she will not even think of another man for fear of upsetting her late husband. I am very fortunate to not have to think that way!
Nevertheless, we have guilt, we survivors. I have always said that meeting Dave meant that I could mourn the loss of Wayne, without confusing that with the loss of my future. I was free to focus on losing Wayne. And that was true, but I remain haunted by a recurring dream ever since his death. In the dream, he comes back (from somewhere, always in the dream he’d been away, in a hospital, overseas) and I don’t know what to do. He was supposed to be gone. He isn’t, he never will be. Not in that deep subconscious place in me, anyway.
__ why are you driven to write about that time, and your times? Was it something he said?
Shortly before Wayne died, he signed two contracts with his publisher. One was for Barker, which was published posthumously, and the launch of which became a kind of funeral. A book launch seemed the most fitting way to say goodbye to a great writer. The other manuscript was what became Dead Man on a Bike, a memoir about living with cancer, a follow-up to Rollercoaster, but also a meditation on cycling and its importance in his life. I helped Wayne finish Barker; I brought his laptop up to bed and transcribed his edits and additions for him directly into the manuscript. When he was satisfied with it, we sent it off to Turnstone Press. Dead Man, on the other hand, sat unfinished, and in the final days he asked me if I would finish it for him. Of course I said yes. It gathered dust on the table in the living room because every time I picked it up, I would read a paragraph or two and then close up, shut down, stall. It was too much, too difficult right after his death. I could barely breathe. But then one day I started reading a chapter that was unfinished, and I knew how it had to end. The words raced out of me, as if guided by some unseen hand. And after I finished, a poem came to mind, and then another, and another. Over the winter of 2015-2016 I finished his memoir and wrote most of what turned into Death Becomes Us. Was it something he said? Maybe it was everything he let me say. He encouraged me to write, in life and in death.
__ what have you discovered by writing about then, the transition and now? About writing itself?
This is without doubt the trickiest question. I am not sure that I discovered anything about the periods that I have written about in the book – the falling in love, the diagnosis, living with cancer, death/grieving, and starting again. Those are all passages in my life that I have inside me. I do not believe that writing is a purely creative process (inspiration, muse, all that): I believe that writing is a creative process derived from a ton of hard work. It’s like exercise. Often I don’t even want to get started, but like heading out on the bike, I warm up after ten minutes or so, and then I don’t want to stop. Wayne always talked about the honesty required in writing (the T-shirt warning: “be careful what you say, it’ll end up in my novel”), and through the process of writing these poems I digged deeper than I have before, into territory that is purely honest. Adaptations, for one – you pointed out that one, and you are correct, it was very hard for me to put in print that another piece of Wayne was gone, but that is what it was, and the admission made it even more so. I’m not particularly interested in poetry that is first-person disclosure – me, me, I did this, I feel that – but if there’s no honesty, then it’s just words. I would like to think that I discovered a balance between the coolness of a simile and the heat, the passion, of honesty.
