My encounter with Timothy Findley

In 1995 I had a brief correspondence with Timothy Findley. After reading The Piano Man's Daughter, I sent him a long-winded letter and received a friendly response. Delightfully, his letter turned up today as I was sorting through old files. It is dated October 20, 1995:

Your letter (and admirable poem) have been forwarded to France, where I am currently hiding out for a couple of months, in order to escape the phone and the FAX long enough to make a start on the next two books.

He followed this with some reflection on his family and inspiration for The Piano Man's Daughter. Then: "I wish you well with your own writing, and hope, indeed, that our paths may one day cross."

I suppose my original letter had been reaching out to for a positive role model as a gay writer. It seemed possible our correspondence might continue. Unfortunately his reply arrived in the middle of my marriage disintegrating. My wife and I separated in January 1996. I was in the worst emotional distress of my life and didn't get around to writing him again until January 1997. That time, he didn't respond.

I attended a reading he gave in Guelph when Pilgrim was released in 1999. By then his health was visibly deteriorating. I spoke to him briefly and gave him a handmade book with some of my poems in it.

On June 21, 2002, I was attending a gay and lesbian choral festival in Toronto. Keynote speaker at the banquet was CBC broadcaster Bill Richardson, another prominent gay Canadian. He announced that Timothy Findley had died earlier that day, and I burst into tears.