With heavy hearts the family of Bill Lennon announces his peaceful passing on Wednesday February 21, 2018 while in the loving and supportive environment of Jocelyn House Hospice.

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On February 15, 1946 Bill was born into a family of two older sisters, Margaret and Barbara, and an older brother, Larry, three more sisters Kathy, Carla and Arlene and one more brother, Ed would follow.

 

At that time, the family lived in Winnipeg, moved to Wheatland, Mantioba, which was adjacent to the Rivers Air force base where Dad ran a grocery store and post office. After a few years we moved back to Winnipeg where Bill spent the rest of his childhood. As an adult, Bill lived for some years in the Niagara Falls area of Ontario, eventually returning home to Winnipeg.

 

As a young man, Bill loved driving, and owning a sports car was his dream. Eventually, he bought a used MGB sports car.  He adored that car until the repair bills started pouring in. It was soon gone and he bought an almost-new 1966 Sunbeam Alpine sports roadster. Driving that car put an ear-to-ear smile on his face.

 

Another of Bill’s passions was reading. 5,760, that’s roughly how many books Bill read in his lifetime. Any time you saw Bill, his nose would be in a book. If you were meeting him at a restaurant and he was late, the best thing to do was to go out into the parking lot and check his car. Most times there he would be: reading a book, totally unaware of the time. Bill’s appetite for reading was voracious,

he consumed books like a starving man at a steak dinner.

 

Bill’s working career started in the grocery business, where he worked for several of the large supermarket companies but soon enough his love

of driving drew him to a career change. He moved on to work for the Winnipeg Transit System.  Driving those big buses was a huge thrill for Bill.

After several years with Winnipeg Transit, Bill changed jobs but stuck to driving  for Grey Goose Bus Lines, driving highway  coaches on routes all over Manitoba. Eventually he drove chartered tour buses all over North America and this was ideal for Bill, as it combined his love of driving with the joy of visiting so many new places.

 

On the personal side, Bill married the girl next door, Brenda Hanley. Together, Brenda and Bill had three children, all boys, Troy, Kevin and Patrick. Bill loved his boys and was very proud of them and their accomplishments. He loved to talk about their talents, abilities and interests.

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Unfortunately Bill’s health started to fail him at a young age. When he was in his late thirties, he started to have circulation problems, his legs would go numb and he had trouble walking more than a few steps at a time. At thirty nine he had surgery which corrected the problem, but more cardiac health issues followed. Over the years Bill suffered from many heart attacks and had several operations, including open heart triple by-pass

surgery. We all thought, including Bill himself, that one day the family would receive a phone call to announce his passing from a sudden heart attack, but this was not the case. 

 

In the early summer of 2017,  while a patient at the St. Boniface Hospital Cardiac Care Ward, Bill was informed by the doctors that he was not expected to live more than six months. It took Bill a while to come to terms with the shock and finality of this news. But as the weeks and months slipped by, Bill thought that knowing in advance that he had limited time was better than a sudden passing from another heart attack. He felt that this gave him the opportunity to bid farewell, to say goodbye to his family, in particular to his boys, Patrick, Kevin and Troy.

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Bill was extremely fortunate to become a resident of Jocelyn House Hospice for the last months of his life. The motto that Jocelyn House uses is “ where people come to live”. This was certainly the case for Bill, Jocelyn House became his home, he was truly happy living there, happier than he had been for years. The staff and volunteers at Jocelyn House

provided for Bill’s medical, physical and spiritual needs with loving care, they laughed with him and yes at times they cried with him. Bill said often that living at Jocelyn House felt like he had “died and gone to heaven”.

 

For Bill’s family having him live at Jocelyn House was a great comfort. We could see that Bill was well supported and cared for, better than we could ever have expected. Because of this, Bill’s family would encourage those who are interested to donate their time as volunteers or financially to ensure that the outstanding work and service that Jocelyn House Hospice provides to our community can carry on.

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Yesterday, you were where we are now, and then you were gone; but one of these tomorrows, we will all be happily together again.

 

Until that day, remember that we love you, Bill, and we miss you.