We have all been drawn to this holy sanctuary today to glorify God and
to remember and revere Floyd Carleton Barnes, Junior, our father,
husband, brother, uncle, grandfather, great grandfather, and friend.
The middle child of three, he was born in Schenectady, New York to
parents Floyd Carleton and Lillian Adelaide in 1926. Shortly after his
birth, the family moved to Toronto, Canada, where his father was employed
as a high voltage switching specialist by Canadian General Electric.
During high school, he took piano lessons, but didn't advance too far--
he was always more interested in creating his own compositions than
practicing the pieces assigned by his piano teacher. Fortunately, his
orchestra teacher encouraged this interest, and Floyd's first
composition-- a school hymn-- was performed by the school orchestra. Upon
graduation from high school, he followed in his father's footsteps by earning
a degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Toronto in
1948.
A couple of years later, while chauffeuring a woman to a church camp in
North Carolina, he met a young woman by the name of Carolyn. Over the
winter they corresponded, and the next summer he rode down on his
motorcycle and proposed to her. A week later, they were married in her home
in Hendersonville, North Carolina. A romantic week-long honeymoon in a
rustic cabin in the mountains ensued. The cabin was so rustic in fact,
that there was a six-foot water snake living in the chimney! All went
well, though, and he brought Carolyn to Toronto on his motorcycle,
where they moved into the top floor of his parents' home. About this time,
he felt called to the clergy and enrolled in Emanuel College at the
University of Toronto.
The following summer, their student mission field was St. Joseph's
Island-- a small community at the north end of Lake Michigan. It was there
that their first daughter was born. Upon graduation from seminary, he
decided not to get ordained, and instead moved to Virginia Beach, where
they lived on 17th St. and he worked as a high school math teacher. It
was there that his second daughter was born. The next Fall, he received
a grant from the Association for Research and Enlightenment to do a
dream research project, which was destined to continue for the rest of his
life.
A year later, they moved back to Canada, and he was assigned a pastoral
charge with the United Church of Canada. Over the next six years,
another daughter and two sons arrived. Then, in 1962, with wife and five
kids in tow, he returned to Virginia Beach. After five years of
struggling to feed a family of five, doing odd jobs, he decided to return to
the United Church of Canada. So in 1967, the family made their last
northward trek together, settling in the small community of Warsaw, in
central Ontario. There he began organic gardening in earnest, and
eventually built a greenhouse. By then all the children were in school, and
old enough to help. The annual month-long summer vacation took them on
camping adventures throughout the United States and Canada, and always
included a visit to Virginia Beach and a stay with Carolyn's relatives
in North Carolina.
It was a few years later that the he embarked upon what was perhaps the
most ambitious project of his life. He came across a book in the
library entitled "Build a Boat in Your Own Backyard" and sent away for plans
to build a 25-foot sailboat. Together with a friend who was a sawmill
owner, he walked through the forest choosing which trees would be
sacrificed for the project. The wood was cut to order and delivered to the
house. Over the next four or five years the boat took shape, moving
from garage to basement to abandoned cheese factory, and eventually to a
farmer's barn. It was finally launched in the summer of 1979, but no
one in the family had any sailing experience. Again, books came to the
rescue, with the Time Life series "Learning to Sail" providing the
necessary instruction. I was privileged to spend a glorious summer with
him, learning to sail on the beautiful Bay of Quinte, in Lake Ontario.
After resigning from the United Church of Canada in 1980, the epic
journey began. With wife Carolyn and son Paul as crew, he set forth from
Kingston, on the north shore of Lake Ontario. Through the Erie Barge
Canal, down the Hudson River, along the Inter-Coastal Waterway, and
across the Chesapeake Bay-- enduring crew seasickness, "wife overboard",
and "skipper asleep at the wheel", they arrived safely three weeks later
in Virginia Beach. A few months later, he connected with the Wedding
Chapel-By-the-Sea, where he has performed thousands of weddings over the
past two and a half decades.
Eventually, he and Carolyn went their separate ways, and he married his
present wife, Linda, in 1995. She has been his loving companion and
tireless caregiver throughout the past eleven years.
During his retirement, he was finally able to focus on music, studying
composition and arranging at Old Dominion University, singing in the
choir at First Presbyterian, and playing cello in the Virginia Beach
Community Orchestra. During his lifetime, he produced over fifty musical
works, a few of which you will hear in this service today. The haunting
"Elegy for Flute and Strings" was just released on CD a week before he
passed away, and you'll have an opportunity to hear it in the
fellowship hall, following the service.
When we were growing up, television viewing was rarely permitted.
Instead of watching TV, we were encouraged to play together and to create
our own entertainment-- music, reading, crafts, and hobbies. Over the
years, he read us the entire series of Hardy Boys mystery books, and
"The Adventures of Tom Swift, Teenage Genius". In the winter, he helped
us build elaborate snow forts, and took us tobogganing. In the Spring,
he tapped the sugar maple trees in our yard and we made maple syrup.
In the summer, he built us bicycles from old discarded parts, and took
us on wonderful camping adventures and visits to his mother's cottage.
Every year in late August, he would take a trip to the Niagara
Peninsula, and load up the van with bushels of fresh-picked peaches and pears.
His self-discipline is legendary. He spent most mornings in prayer and
meditation, and we knew that he was not to be disturbed! From the age
of 18 until just a few years ago, he would take a nightly walk before
going to bed. He never failed to do this, no matter how bad the weather
was! I had the honour of joining him on "his walk" on many occasions,
enjoying good conversation and gazing at the night sky together.
And was he meticulous! He logged everything: time and odometer
reading every time he stopped for anything while driving, every dream he ever
had, how many beans or tomatoes or squash he picked from the garden--
the list goes on and on! Now if only someone could read his
handwriting....
In a lot of ways, he was ahead of his time: brushing his teeth with
baking soda(!); insisting on organic gardening (no pesticides, herbicides,
or chemical fertilizers for HIS vegetables!); and using aluminum
cookware was a definite "no-no"! Of course all of these attitudes have now
become mainstream.
We are blessed to be children of such a wonderful father. Despite
having his faults and burdens to bear-- as we all do-- he always kept a
positive attitude, and had seemingly infinite patience. And he never
harboured a grudge against anyone. Throughout his life, my father taught
us many valuable lessons: the value of hard work, the importance of
forgiveness, and most of all, that we should always look for the Christ
in others. His love of music, art, science, and nature-- and all
things creative-- is a valuable legacy that he passed on to us.
We will surely miss him throughout the years to come, but he lives on
in us, and in the creative works he left behind.
