On Family, Hockey and Healing

by Walter Gretzky

My other priority was to make sure that everyone had a good time. By everyone, I don’t just mean the celebrities—though I wanted them to be well looked after—but also the local people, who paid their money to see the celebrities play tennis or baseball. There were always a lot of kids around, our own, too, and relatives. I wanted to make sure that they didn’t get overlooked in all the excitement.

  After the tournaments were over, we’d invite the celebrities out to the farm for some private downtime. We felt that was important, because they’d been “on” for so long, and we wanted them to be able to relax. Those were some of the nicest times of all. We’d have a barbecue, and everybody would be lounging around on the lawn out there. It was the biggest thrill of all to my mother, who got to meet her favourite soap stars. They were so nice to her. The ones who came were the ones who had a lot of respect for Wayne and would never have done anything to embarrass him or his family.

  DANNY HOPPER, NEPHEW: As kids, we used to be invited up from North Carolina for those tournaments. Walter was very good at seeking out things that we could do. You’d seen these celebrities on TV, but this was a chance to go and put a live face, and flesh and bones to the person. To find out how normal a lot of them were! Peter Barton, who was on The Young and the Restless, we had a good time with him, he was very likeable. We got time to talk to a lot of the music stars, Platinum Blonde, and so on. After one of the tournaments, at the get-together at the farm, Eddie Murray, Paul Coffey, Wayne, Keith, Brent and myself were out in the yard playing a little touch football. Big Wally would be in the middle of it. He would take the time so that if you wanted to meet somebody, he would introduce you. He made you feel as much a part of it as he could. For a lot of the stars, my feeling was it was always a joy. When they came to the farm, people were just like anybody else. I wouldn’t say all of them, but a lot of them would come. You could let your hair down. We’d have two or three grills going. It’d be great. It was an easy time. The public eye wasn’t there, the TV camera, the newspaper reporter. I don’t know how they kept them away, but I can remember that nobody ever imposed.

  Wally would stretch himself as far as he could, getting the stars to come and realize, let’s all be down-to-earth here, have a good time. He was more at ease there than at the tournament. He was a bundle of nerves during the tournament, then afterwards, he would be, phew, we got through this. And everyone would mellow down.

  MURRAY ANGUS: Walter was the final say, the beginning, the end and the middle. We didn’t want to bother Wayne with stuff because Wayne wasn’t here. He was playing hockey. He was busy, as he should have been. Walter fell into this role of being in charge. The first year, he stood back and just let us do it. And it went off okay. And then the second year, it started to grow. Wally started to get more into it. And nobody but Wally would ask the questions that people needed to answer. It was funny, because he could relate better to the normal amounts of money as opposed to the $150,000 or $200,000 that we would raise. We would go in, and I’d say, “Wally, I need you to sign this cheque for $78,000 to Talking Books at the CNIB, and I need you to sign this cheque for $52,000, and we’ve got to pay this $214 phone bill. And he’d be, “$214! Oh my God!” I mean, the big cheques, he’d just sign them, but the $214 phone bill got the biggest reaction.

  He wouldn’t let anybody get away with stuff. He took this seriously. And with him, the simplest, easiest way of doing something was always the best. “Don’t complicate things,” he’d say. “I’ve never complicated my life.” I’d say, “Oh yeah, right. Wayne’s career is not complicated?” And he’d say, “Oh, I don’t know what happened there!”

  Everything was simple with Wally. It was yes or no, it was either the truth or it wasn’t. All these guys who were after Wayne’s career back then, they all had briefcases and suits. They had companies and legal departments, and they would shake his hand, and then it wouldn’t happen the way they said. But the thing about Wally, you couldn’t pull the wool over his eyes.

  Murray’s right, I did want to keep things simple, and I didn’t have patience with people who tried to complicate things or get greedy. The tournament became a corporate sponsorship. It was funny, because the local committee would meet the sponsors, and the sponsors would be a big, flashy presence, maybe pushing the committee around a little bit. I would go to the meeting, and suddenly, they’d behave. I’d say to them, “What you get out of this as a promotion, that’s up to you. All I want to make sure of is that those kids get money at the end.” After eleven years, the corporate guys wanted more. So we would have to put up bigger tents and do more promotion, and justifiably so, because the sponsors were putting up a lot of money. But they lost sight of the fact that all I wanted to do was make sure the blind kids got knapsacks and talking books, and if they couldn’t afford to buy a machine to listen to a talking book, someone would give them one. Simple as that.

  The ’80s were certainly among the busiest and most exciting years of my life, and I can’t disagree with anyone from that time who portrays me as a chain-smoking worrywart with headaches and ulcers. There were many happy events during those years, many of them to do with Wayne and all his amazing hockey achievements. Keith and Brent were launching their hockey careers, too. I travelled around the world and met some wonderful people. Wayne got married to Janet in a beautiful ceremony in Edmonton in 1988, with many of our extended family members present (Wayne made sure of that). And Paulina, our first granddaughter, was born.

  There were some not-so-happy events too, as there are in any family. Perhaps the saddest for all of us was the death of my mother, on December 11, 1988, only a few days before Paulina came to us. I was pretty devastated. We’d been so close. She’d been ill with leukemia for some time, and at eighty-five, had lived a good, long life. She was such a strong and supportive force in our lives and had lived to see her grandkids accomplish a lot, and to be very proud. We did what we could in her last days to alleviate her worries about what would happen to Ellen. I was so relieved when Phyllis agreed to take her in to live with us, and grateful—it’s a lot of hard work to deal with Ellen, and you have to be committed to do it day after day, year after year.

  The day of my mother’s funeral, we formed a convoy behind her for one last drive past the farmhouse. It was important to me that we do that, in honour of her memory, and all the time she had spent living there, raising all of us, giving us the best chance she knew how to in life. The place feels diminished without her presence, but I believe her spirit does live on there, and, of course, we will never forget her.

  I’ve told you a few stories here, and some of my friends and family have stepped in to offer their memories, as well. I hope I’ve captured some of the flavour of what it was like during those years. But I must emphasize that I’ve had help re-constructing these events in my life. After what happened to me in 1991, my memories from about the late ’70s to the middle of the ’90s are virtually wiped out. That may seem hard to believe, but it’s true. Everything you’ve read in this chapter, with the exception of the odd glimmer or small vivid recollection, is gone from my memory.

  WAYNE: Back before his stroke, Dad was stressed to the point of no return. He lived on buttermilk to coat his stomach. His smoking was fierce. I’ll never forget the Canada Cup championships from ’87 to ’91. It was great, because they were in Hamilton, so I could stay at home. But my dad was more intense about it than I was! He was so nervous, he could not even drive himself to the games. Someone else had to do it. I’d drive with him to try and get him to calm down.

  It is no understatement to say that what was about to happen to me would change my life forever. I never could have predicted it, although in hindsight, given some of my habits and stress, the fact that I’d ended up in some sort of health crisis might not have been so hard to imagine. But at the time, nothing was signalling to me that the next phase of my life would unfold with any more difficulties or setbacks than it ever had. I just assumed, like most of us do until something happens to us, that I was in
complete control of my future.

  Well, as they say, the best-laid plans.… I couldn’t have been more wrong.

  chapter four

  STROKE

  I didn’t have a lot to complain about in life, as the day began on October 13, 1991. I’d just had my fifty-third birthday and was five months into my retirement. I was getting into some new routines and looking forward to having more time for hobbies and outside interests, and more freedom to travel. I loved to visit my sons and spend time with my grandchildren. Wayne was living in L.A.; Keith was playing with the San Diego Gulls; Glen was selling real estate in Edmonton; and Brent was playing in Belleville for the Bulls. Kim was still living at the farm in Canning, working for the CNIB. We were all in the middle of planning a big fiftieth birthday celebration for Phyllis. I hope she’s gotten over it, but thanks to me, the party never happened.

  My world stopped that day in October. Just stopped.

  I don’t remember much of anything about the day, or the many days previous to it, or the many days of recovery after it. But with the help of people who do remember, I will reconstruct what happened. I am lucky that only part of those years are missing for me.

  The farm was, and still is, one of the places in this world where I most like to spend my time, and with Kim there, I was able to go out pretty much whenever I wanted. It was a beautiful, sunny, autumn day, and I had decided to whitewash the old cellar, while Kim and her roommate, Laurie Ham, were at work. Though my mother had passed away three years earlier, her presence was still strongly felt at the farm, keeping us all in line.

  The cellar was where my mother would put all her preserves, and there were still jars of her fruit and vegetables on the shelves. We continued to use it for storage, and I wanted to spruce it up. I was down there painting, when I was struck by the most terrible, violent headache. As I’ve said, I frequently suffered from headaches if I skipped a meal or hadn’t slept, but this one had to have been the worst I’d ever experienced. I must have known that it was serious, and that I had to get out of there, because I dropped my paintbrush and made my way out of the cellar and upstairs to the kitchen. I’ve never finished that paint job.

  One thing I am truly grateful for is the fact that Laurie Ham was at the farmhouse that day, because without her help, I am sure I wouldn’t be here today. I knew Laurie well. She and Kim had been friends since their teens, and her dad operated a junior league hockey team in Brantford. It was unusual for her to be at home like that in the middle of the day. She had been away on a business trip and was going away again, and had only come home on the spur of the moment to re-pack her luggage. I find that quite uncanny.

  LAURIE HAM: There are some images in my mind from that day that are so vivid, and then a lot of it just swirls around. But I do have a technicolour memory of Walter coming into the kitchen from the basement, looking pale and shaky, and saying, “Laurie, I have a terrible headache. Get me a couple of Aspirins.” I remember him sort of grabbing onto the counter-top as he said it. I got the Aspirins. He was dizzy and still holding onto the counter. You just knew it was bad, something more than a headache. I said almost immediately, “I think I better take you to the hospital.”

  I guess I didn’t really put up much of an argument, which surprised Laurie, because normally I would have shrugged off going to the doctor, let alone a hospital emergency room, about a headache. Even though at the time she knew nothing about aneurysms or strokes, she had the presence of mind to get me to the hospital as quickly as possible.

  Apparently, before we left, I wanted to change my pants! I’d been working in an old pair, and of course I wouldn’t have wanted to go to the hospital looking sloppy. My mother’s influence showing itself there for sure! But at that point, I got quite dizzy, and there was no way I could do anything but get into the car. I was still walking under my own steam, but getting weaker and more disoriented. Laurie wasted no time once we were in the car. The Willett Hospital in Paris is roughly a ten-minute drive from the farm, and she floored it. I wasn’t saying a whole lot, but Laurie tells me I did warn her to slow down.

  When we landed on the doorstep of the hospital, Laurie ran in, yelling, “I need help out here.” They came out pretty quickly with a gurney and I was taken inside, and then I was sick to my stomach. It seemed we were there for a fair while. Although I was apparently conscious at that point, I don’t recall any of it. Every time I hear the details, I feel bad that my family had to go through this experience.

  Laurie called Phyllis and told her, “I don’t want you to panic, but I’m at the hospital with Walter.” Phyllis got hold of Kim, and they rushed to the hospital. The doctors told them that I was being taken to Hamilton General Hospital. They got me into an ambulance, and we headed to Hamilton in a convoy. I think at that point, the staff at the Paris hospital didn’t want to say what they thought it was, but Dr. Hutton, the first physician to see me there, later said that he looked at me and knew it wasn’t just a tension headache or a migraine, because of the fact that I couldn’t lie down and was vomiting. He said that he just had a feeling it was an aneurysm.

  By the time we got to Hamilton, I was unconscious and taken to intensive care. Kim and Phyllis were escorted into a little room set aside for the family, where they anxiously waited for any news of my condition. One of the best neurosurgeons around, Dr. Rocco de Villiers, was brought in to evaluate the situation. (I would learn later that Dr. de Villiers was in the midst of recovering from tragic events in his own life. The whole family marvels at the fact that Dr. de Villiers had the strength to look after someone in my situation at such a difficult time, and knows that without him I would not be around. We are very grateful for his courage and generosity.)

  I think at that point, Phyllis and Kim still thought, “It’s okay now. We’re here, there’s a specialist, this will be explained and taken care of.” But then Dr. de Villiers said to Phyllis, “Can you call your boys? I think they better get here as quickly as they can.”

  PHYLLIS: On the day of the stroke, I was here at home, doing laundry. I was downstairs when the phone rang, and it was Laurie, saying she had taken Wally to the hospital in Paris. So I called Kim at the CNIB. She picked me up right away, and we went over there. We just thought it was one of his bad headaches, maybe brought on by the paint fumes down in that little cellar. He was sitting there in the emergency room, awake, and was able to tell me that his head was just pounding. They called an ambulance. Kim and I followed it to Hamilton. We didn’t really know what was going on until Dr. de Villiers said it was bad, we should call in the family. Everyone was scattered all over the place, but they all got in. Then we just had to wait and hope for the best.

  KIM: I had just come through the door from shopping for decorations for my mother’s surprise fiftieth birthday party that my dad and I were planning when I heard the phone ring. It was my mum saying that Wally was at the hospital in Paris. I picked her up at her house and we drove there. On the way, Mum said that Wally had been painting in the cellar and that they would probably call at any moment and say he should take two pills and rest. We were both taking it lightly because he had never been sick in his life, and he had been fine when I spoke to him that morning.

  Then as the emergency doors slid open, we could hear the sound of a man vomiting and Mum said, “That’s your father!” He was sitting up in bed when we saw him. He looked over to my mom and said, “Phyllis, I’m so sick.” But it still didn’t kick in that there was a problem. All of a sudden, Dr. Hutton rushed in and said, “We’re transporting Wally to Hamilton.”

  We got to Hamilton before the ambulance. Dad was still conscious and we followed him to his room at emergency where he stayed for about an hour, until a nurse said they were going to move him to ICU.

  PHYLLIS: When I was told that Wally had to be moved to the ICU, I finally realized it was serious. I immediately called my sister Sandi, and she left work and came to the hospital right away. I knew she’d be able to help us understand what the doctors were saying
, as she had had a brain tumour only a few years earlier.

  While we were in the waiting room, Kim was on the phone speaking to Wayne. At that moment, Dr. de Villiers came into the room to give Kim and me the prognosis. Kim handed the phone over to the doctor so he could explain it directly to Wayne. With the three of us standing in a circle around the phone, we all came to understand at the same time the grave seriousness of the situation. The doctor handed the phone back to Kim—Wayne said he was on the way.

  Kim and I went for a coffee to pass some of the time before the rest of the family arrived, and met Butch Steele, who had already heard the news on the radio and had come straight to the hospital. Later that evening, Sil and Mary Rizzetto came to lend their support.

  KIM: I think they had done an angiogram by that point, and Dad was having blood vessel spasms, so they couldn’t find the aneurysm. They couldn’t operate until the spasms stopped, and this was really a risky period, when the worst could have happened.

  BRENT: I was in Belleville. I had a game, and my coach called me into his office. I didn’t know what was up. Then he shut the door, and I thought maybe I was traded or something! But he told me my dad was really sick. I left right then, went to Hamilton and met everyone at the hospital. I still didn’t know really what had happened. We all rushed into the room, sat beside the bed, you know. We tried to talk to him. When you don’t get any movement or anything from your father when he’s lying there, that’s pretty scary. It’s something I wouldn’t want anyone to go through. Definitely scary, and painful.

  GLEN: I was living in Edmonton at the time. Around eight o’clock in the morning, I was going to work, and I was talking to Dad on my car phone. Everything was fine. He told me he was going out to the farm to paint the basement. We talked a lot on the phone like that. Casual stuff. A few hours later, Kim phoned, and she was crying. She said, “You’ve gotta get home. Dad’s really sick.” I tried to book a flight, and wouldn’t you know, it’s October in Edmonton and there was a major snowstorm that day. It was unbelievable. I was told, you are not going to get out of here today. Eventually, they re-opened the airport, and I was able to catch a flight to Toronto that got in around midnight. I went right to the hospital in Hamilton. And then we just hung around and waited. All we knew was that Dad was a pretty sick guy.