Happy Birthday Mirella!

Please meet my friend Mirella whom I honour today with a tribute for her Birthday and her friendship to me.


I am a firm believer that we are blessed with people who come in and out of our lives for a purpose. People to teach and learn from, to love and watch over and people who mysteriously show up just when you need them.

Cynics won't ever acknowledge such beliefs but who am I to care about what someone else believes. Not at this stage of the game.

This year, more than ever, has been about long ago friends surfacing once more to make contact, to rekindle relations from years gone by and to offer forgiveness for past transgressions.


Mirella and I met at Sheridan College in Oakville back in the 1980's where we were studying Fashion Design. Mirella and Bessie, her side kick in all things and best friend, were the lights this small town boy was attracted to. Mirella was energy, enthusiasm, funny, sexy, Italian! And only too happy to have this young man around her to talk and laugh with, play games and get into trouble with. We also worked hard, well, Mir did - and hey! we both made the top 10 in the same industry critiqued competition which went in her favour but could not help my pitiful performance. But that's another story.


Mirella even helped me get a job at the O'keefe Centre (now the Sony Centre)where she worked as a Server. Mir put in a good word with the Maitre d'hôtel of the restaurant that kept me afloat as I tried to get settled living in Toronto. We shared intimacies as friends will about the guys we were dating, struggles with getting jobs in the industry and gripes about family. I remember dancing. Lots and lots of dancing.

And then we moved on and 23+ years later reconnected via Facebook this past April.


We had a smashing lunch and a visit to her home that she shares with her husband Sandro and their children.

And then I got sick. Not being able to use a phone I never returned her calls that she had made wondering what was up. But she was on my mind and I asked my brother Michael to contact Mirella and let her know I was in the hospital.

Immediately she sprung into action. Visiting, making food for my family members who were giving me constant care and gifting me with music and even a hat from her husband Sandro to keep my head warm after loosing it all to chemotherapy.

Like so many other friends and family that visited me Mirella was not about to allow Paddy to wallow in pity. Upbeat, positive, frank with advice and strength of character to make me keep my eye on the prize of beating the Cancer, of getting out of hospital and the promise of being able to eat food again - most especially her Lasagna!


I can share with you a wonderful experience that Mirella took part in one afternoon while I was a patient at Princess Margaret Hospital. My brother Michael had arranged for his parish priest, Father Pat, to perform the Roman Catholic sacrament Anointing Of The Sick.

The chief Biblical text concerning the rite is James 5:14-15: "Is any among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; and the prayer of faith will save the sick man, and the Lord will raise him up; and if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven."


Mirella, along with a few other close friends and family who could be there stood and prayed over me in this very intimate and powerful experience. It's hard to describe the feeling of this positive energy moving around and through you. In recalling the experience one thing that brought Mirella and I closer as friends is our shared belief in God and the power of prayer. This subject came up during our reunion lunch. Not everyone wears this belief on their shirtsleeve and many of us go about our lives quietly in service but none the less with great Faith in God. Mirella is one and I thank her for that.

As a busy Mother, Wife, Sister, Friend, Boss, Mirella still makes time to squeeze me into her hectic schedule and even if it's to enjoy a fresh plum on a park bench on a sunny fall day as we recently did - it brings me such joy!


I love you Bella! Happy Birthday.

Patrick.