About Me

 

Writing

I love words.  I’ve always loved words. 

As a child on a dairy farm near Wingham, three hours west of Toronto, I was often alone.  Television-less by choice (my parents’, not mine),  and with older siblings gone from home, I had little to do other than read.  I consumed books like I consumed milk - in large quantities and indiscriminately - for like milk, books were free and plentiful.  My parents’ collection was full of English classics, my sisters left their more modern fare for me, and the library was at my disposal.   I could talk just as easily about Pooh sticks or Avonlea as I could about Madame Defarge, Frodo Baggins, or the White Oaks of Jalna.  It all fed the same need in me to escape to other worlds.    

I won a summer reading contest at the library when I was 10, and was disappointed the prize was a kids’ book.  “Dick Wittington’s cat?” I said with disgust.  Hadn’t the librarians seen the stuff I was reading?  

In grade 8, my French teacher snatched a book from my desk, saying accusingly, “Do you parents know you’re reading this?”  With the self-righteousness of a 13 year old, I assured her they did.  She backtracked quickly, saying, “Can I read it when you’re done?”  It was Jacqueline Susann’s best-selling and very adult novel,“Valley of the Dolls.”  

About the same time, I published my first article in the local monthly magazine, “The Rural Voice.” It chronicled my experience living with the men and women dad hired to work on the farm.  I was excited to get it published, but regrettably, it didn’t kick off a great writing career.  

Through high school my appreciation for language grew when I was taught by the English teacher whose earlier student, Alice Munro, went on to win the Nobel prize for literature. Munro was in Mrs. Tiffin’s class in her first year of teaching; I was in her last.   Tiffin instilled in me a great love of quality writing, from novels, to essays, to Lennon & McCartney.  

Still, the urge to write for an audience remained dormant.   

As I went through undergraduate, graduate school, and my years working at the City of Toronto, I wrote as needed to pass or get paid.   I did however write letters to friends as a way to spin a good story and share the minutiae of my life in what I like to think was an amusing way. 

My first real foray into wiring for others happened when in 2002 I left Toronto for law school on the west coast.  Suddenly I had many people to keep up with and the technology - email - to do it efficiently.  I started writing regular group updates. These ramped up in 2004 when I spent four months doing an internship in Brussels.  I was 38, living away from Canada for the first time, and wanted to share observations about my day to day life.   

I picked up the habit again when, after my return from law school, the love of my life was diagnosed with cancer. I had news to share and many people anxious to hear it.  I resumed the update emails and realized again the great joy and for the first time, the therapeutic value, of writing.  

It took a pandemic though to bring it all together.   It was August 8, 2020.  I had been in COVID 19 solitary confinement for 21 weeks.  Did I need to be that solitary? No.  Ontario pandemic restrictions had lifted between the first and second waves allowing gatherings, “bubbles”, and so on.  I knew the province was moving too far, too fast to relax restrictions in favour of the economy.  There was community spread.  People were still dying.  People were out and about but not me.  I was at home alone and needed a project.  

I had talked about writing a book about my experience with Jack since he died in November 2018.  I had written parts of this story for different purposes.  People had told me I have a style that is accessible and a story worth sharing.  

Writing a book is the mother of all projects so I made it my COVID 19 project.


 

Caregiving and Death

My husband, Jack, died with medical assistance on November 19, 2018.  He’d been diagnosed with cancer nearly three years earlier.  During his 2016 treatment and again when the cancer metastasized in 2018, I was his caregiver.  

I am not a born nurturer.  Jack wasn’t really the ideal sick person either.  During his illness, I read about other spouses’ caregiving experiences, trying to glean something to help.  Those books didn’t speak to me.  They were written by people who seemed more suited to the role.  Or they were written by people who cared for model patients.  Or those writers were not telling the whole truth.  

Reading them made me feel inadequate, not worthy of the encouragement and compliments  I received from people while I was a caregiver and since.   I felt I had to keep my frustrations and my bitchiness deeply hidden.  I was out of my depth, seemingly ill equipped.  

After Jack died, I decided to share my experience, hoping it would help others.  First, I told part of my story orally.  I was the post-lunch speaker at a meeting two weeks after Jack died.  Scheduled to speak about the impact of the legalization of cannabis on multi-residential housing, I realized over lunch people wanted to hear about medical assistance in death (MAID).  I decided to wing it - to share the story of Jack’s death in front of 100 people on about 30 minutes notice.  The room was rapt.  People found my account interesting, because MAID was so new, and the law so unclear to everyone.   

I left the meeting vowing to help people understand the choice afforded some Canadians to end life early.  I knew Jack would support my decision.  A month later, I wrote a three part series for rabble.ca about Jack’s illness running parallel to the development of the MAID law in Canada.  Again, a positive reception.  People were and are hungry to know more about this right.  I was thrilled when the series won a Canadian Online Publishing Award a year later.  

The award buoyed me, motivating me to write more, this time about the carer role.  With the benefit of hindsight, I’ve concluded good caregiving takes many forms and the management and entertaining skills I brought to the job were just as valuable as those of the more nurturing caregiver.  

Perhaps there is no right way to be a caregiver. And perhaps there is no wrong way.  That’s the message I hope people will take away from the book I’m writing.  


Law

For a disproportionate number of us at Iler Campbell, law is a second career. For me it’s a third. I’m not in it for money or prestige. At Iler Campbell we’re lawyers because of what law allows us to do. We all have pet causes, issues that we care deeply about, and believe in ways of living that we think are worth fighting for. And the reason that so many of us became lawyers later in life is that lot of us tried working on these causes in other ways before turning to law.

For many years I worked at the City of Toronto. I held a number of positions there, many of which directly relate to Iler Campbell’s clients’ needs. These include: the City Clerk’s office, managing the Toronto City Council meeting process; and the Freedom of Information Office, implementing privacy legislation.

My ‘second’ career was as director of administration at an international environmental NGO. This organization is, not coincidentally, a client of Iler Campbell. In my five years there I worked quite closely with Ted, and on some occasions, Brian.

It was in this job that I really began to understand the challenges that non-profits face daily as they work with committed but overworked staff, volunteer boards, limited time and money, demanding funders, and well-meaning but sometimes inexperienced volunteers. This experience really pushed me to think about how best I could serve the sector. Law seemed the obvious choice. To tell the truth, it was Ted’s story of going to law school in later life that really inspired me to do the same. It was comforting to me to know that it was possible to get a law degree beyond the age of 25.

I joined Iler Campbell as an articling student in 2005 and was pleased to have been hired on following my call to the bar the next year. I’ve no regrets. Iler Campbell is a great fit because it combines many of my past professional experiences and interests and allows me to work in a range of areas of law inside and outside the courtroom.

I spend most of my time working with our co-op housing clients. Co-ops are a fascinating model for community development and I’m always impressed by the level of commitment that the members have for the model. They work hard to make it work – and it does! I get a charge out of going to co-op board meetings and trying to help them figure out what makes sense for them.

I like to think that I bring something very practical to the advice that I give. I’ve managed legal budgets in a non-profit and I know that they can’t always afford the luxury of the Cadillac of legal opinions – sometimes the reliable and sensible Toyota is all that’s needed. I’m always happiest when clients tell me that they understand what I’ve said. I don’t want to sound like a lawyer.

Presentations and Seminars

Celia is a regular presenter at conferences and education events across Ontario, including:

She is available to speak on a range of topics, primarily geared to housing providers, including human rights, preparing for Landlord and Tenant Board hearings, evictions, employment law, board ethics and privacy.

If you’d like Celia to speak to your event or privately with your board, staff, or clients, please contact her directly.

Community involvement