After her husband died, Shirley Howard moved back to Victoria from Ontario with little more than a bunch of mouths to feed.
That first night, the children — ages 2, 4, 6 and 10 – shared a bed in the Craigflower Motel while Shirley slept on the chesterfield. In the morning, she trudged through the snow to a Chinese grocery, the only store open on New Year’s Day of 1965, to buy milk and bread for the kids, three of whom woke up with the measles.
They made it, though. Howard scraped together $50 to buy an old Austin, got a job as a loans officer, clawed her way up. She studied hard to become Victoria’s “first lady stockbroker” (succeeding despite the men who laid bets that she would fail) and then got her real estate licence, too.
What really kept her afloat was the work she put into buying and remodelling residential properties. At age 95, she vows that her current project — a condo in Parksville, where she lives — is her last, though her family have told her they want that in writing.
Howard is comfortable now. “I don’t have a big income, but I’m very frugal,” she says. “I know how to stretch a dollar.”
Oh, it was a grind back in the 1960s, though. “I remember being totally out of money.” At one point, a tearful Howard found herself in the Salvation Army holding a bag of groceries and a $10 bill given to her by the woman behind the counter. “She wrapped her arms around me and said, ‘Never mind, you’ll give it back some day.’ ”
That was also around the time someone submitted Howard’s name to a Christmas charity, which surprised her with a cheque. “If I remember correctly, it was for $50, which in those days was a lot of money.” Manna from heaven. It happened the next year, too.
Howard isn’t sure if the charity in question was what is now known as the Times Colonist Christmas Fund, but it’s the latter to which she made a donation last week. She hasn’t forgotten the help she received when she needed it. Sometimes it’s your car that has skidded into the ditch, and sometimes you’re the one with the tow rope. What goes around comes around.
“You get back what you give,” she says, quoting Emma Smiley, the longtime, now-deceased Victoria minister whose guidance she still values.
Right now, Howard feels as though she’s getting a lot. “People are being so kind to me this year.” The other day, during a 45-minute mobility-scooter ride to an event at a Parksville church, she stopped at Shoppers Drug Mart in search of a sheet of plastic to keep the rain off her knees. Two women who worked there insisted on covering her in a plush blanket. “I just want to make sure you’re warm,” one told her. That was around the same time that a man in line behind her in Quality Foods said he wanted to pay for her groceries. “Merry Christmas,” he said.
That, in essence, is what the Times Colonist Christmas Fund is all about. It comes down to neighbours being kind to neighbours. Maybe making a donation to the fund doesn’t provide the feel-good boost that comes with offering a hand to someone in person, but it still helps someone. All the money raised flows to Vancouver Island charities that provide help for people who could, as was the case with Shirley Howard in the 1960s, benefit from the goodness of strangers.
We all have our own causes and our own capacity to support them, so if you are not in a position to give to the Christmas fund, that’s fine — but if you are able to do so, know that someone will appreciate it.
HOW TO DONATE TO THE CHRISTMAS FUND
You can donate by going to the Times Colonist Christmas Fund web page at tcchristmasfund.com.
The page is linked to CanadaHelps, which is open 24 hours and provides an immediate tax receipt.
Or mail a cheque to the Times Colonist Christmas Fund, 201-655 Tyee Road, Victoria, B.C. V9A 6X5.
You can also use your credit card by phoning 250-995-4438 from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Monday through Friday.
