I’ve known for a long time I was probably going to have to write this someday.
I prayed that day would never come, but I knew it probably would, and now it’s here.
And I don’t have the words . . .
Last Saturday, Catherine Brunelle passed away due to complications from cancer.
Catherine was an incredible author, my podcast co-host, and, for a time, my best friend.
We both published our first novels around the same time and were featured together in an article about Ottawa authors. Catherine saw my name in the article and decided to send me an email to introduce herself.
I read her book and loved it. We decided to meet for coffee.
It seems strange to look back on that first meeting. Today, virtually everyone I interact with is a writer of some kind. I’m friends with many great novelists. I’ve interviewed hundreds of authors. As a writing coach, I work with many wonderful authors each week. These days I’m completely surrounded by writers, but when I walked into that coffee shop to meet Catherine, it was the first time I’d ever met a real life author.
Up until that point, I was the only person I knew who had written a book, who had managed to complete a manuscript and then figured out the process of getting it edited, designed, and published.
As I talked with Catherine in that coffee shop, I realized I’d found a kindred spirit. Not only had Catherine done everything I had done to get a book written and published, she’d also run a hugely successful crowd funding campaign to support its publication. She was passionate about literature, savvy in the world of self-publishing and social media, and motivated to pursue her creative dreams.
That first meeting over coffee was one of those magical moments, so rare in life, where the hours pass by without you noticing. We had met up after work, and by the time we finished talking, the sun had set and we had both missed dinner. The hours had just dissolved without us noticing.
Something else I remember about that first meeting is Catherine had to go to the bathroom several times throughout our conversation because she’d had a large dose Vitamin C earlier that day.
You see, when I met Catherine, she already had breast cancer.
I never knew her before the cancer.
The entire time I worked with Catherine, she was sick, which makes the joy she brought into my life all the more amazing. She was a joyful, passionate, and very funny person, all while battling this horrible disease month after month, year after year.
Shortly after we became friends, we attended a local book event. I’d been thinking about starting a podcast, so I decided to take the opportunity to interview her using the voice recorder on my phone.
All of the authors at the event did readings from their books, including Catherine. Her book, Claire Never-Ending, featured stories of several generations of Canadian women. The book starts in the present, and then each chapter moves backwards one generation in history. Concurrently, each chapter moves forward one month in a pregnancy. So the first chapter begins with a protagonist named Claire discovering she is pregnant. The next chapter features Claire’s mother one month into her pregnancy with Claire.
It’s a complicated and ingenious story structure, and what fascinated me was that Catherine chose to read one of the final chapters of the book when it was time for her to hit the stage. Afterwards, during the interview, I asked Catherine why she chose to read from the end of the book, rather than the beginning.
She responded, “Because it doesn’t have to be the end. It’s Claire Never-Ending.”
It was a profound statement about the power of literature, family, and legacy.
And the way she said it sounded beautiful. I LOVED the sound of Catherine’s voice.
She had spent time in England and there was the faintest hint of an English accent influencing her speech and the words she chose. Whereas I tend to ramble and speak excitedly, there was always a dignified calm and thoughtfulness to how Catherine spoke.
When I finished interviewing her, she said she wanted to interview some of the other authors at the event the way I’d interviewed her. From there, our first podcast, Ottawa Writes, was born. Ottawa Writes eventually evolved into Write Along Radio, and, altogether, we ended up recording almost 100 podcast episodes together.
Every Wednesday, for a year and half, Catherine and I would hop on Skype or Google Hangouts and record our show. As the weeks went by, we improved as podcasters. We improved as journalists and interviewers. We learned together so much about the world of publishing, marketing, and branding.
And as tends to happen when you put in the effort to consistently create things, other opportunities emerged as a result of our efforts.
We got to record a live episode of the show from Can Con, Ottawa’s great speculative fiction conference. Our show was syndicated on Rabble.ca. We were invited to give a lecture to members of the Canadian Authors Association. Catherine won a grant for us to produce a special podcast episode about the importance of preserving our oceans.
We became creative collaborators, partners in podcasting, and friends.
We were alike in some ways, but in others we were very different. For whatever reason, those similarities and differences merged to form that absolutely magical and rare thing in the creative arts known as chemistry.
We just worked well together.
We had fun and we inspired and motivated one another.
And all the while Catherine was sick.
There were episodes she recorded from her bed because she was recovering from chemo-therapy. There were so many times I had to edit the sound of her coughing out of an episode, times when she could barely swallow.
Yet despite everything life threw her way, Catherine remained perpetually upbeat, optimistic, and genuinely happy. She was in love with life. In love with her husband and her family. In love with writing and creating.
She was stoic, but not in a cold way. She was stoic in a joyful way, a giving way. She brought so much fun and excitement to my life.
In Catherine’s novel, the name “Claire” is passed on through the generations in the form of a middle name. So when my wife gave birth to our third daughter, Holly, we decided to give her the middle name “Catherine”.
My friend and colleague, has passed away, but her memory lives on in my daughter.
Last week, I sent Catherine a picture of Holly Catherine Johns.
She responded, “I think she is SO lovely.”
It was the last thing Catherine ever wrote to me.
But it doesn’t have to be the end.
She’s Catherine never-ending.
