Wayne ‘Doc’ Burke: A Life Lived

Quarantine Letter #55

I will not indulge in “damning with faint praise” (Pope) and know upfront that “I come to bury him not to praise him” (Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar).

Ralph Wayne ‘ Doc’ Burke was born in Barbados on Saturday, September 20, 1952 and died there in the early hours of Tuesday, November 19, 2024. ‘Bolt’, a devoted friend and colleague, tended to him in his dying hours listening to a variety of music: Marty Robbins, Dionne Warwick, Bon Jovi, and Roger Whittaker’s Last Farewell, apparently Doc’s new favourite song.

Predeceased by his parents, Owen and Mary, his brother, Andrew, and numerous relatives and former partners, he is survived by his sister, Michelle, his stepson, Dan, his daughter, Naomi, and her children, and by a number of ex-wives, including me.

Doc was a skilled and enthusiastic surfer, sailor, and water-polo player although he was likely best known for his life-long love of birds and his devotion to their preservation, particularly on the island of Barbados.

In our fourteen years together, I—an avid photographer—took hundreds of photographs of Doc near our homes in three countries, and in more than twenty other countries on countless trips. My favourite, though, is this one in Ontario, Canada:

Here, he is clearly in the prime of his life—likely taken in 1993, he would have been 40 years old, about to begin full-time studies at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario after our year-long stay in St. Lucia where I, working on a CIDA project, established a Business Education Centre for their government, and where he explored dangerous terrain tracking endangered birds.

In the photograph (analog, reproduced numerous times) he and I are in Frontenac Provincial Park, babysitting a fallen eaglet whose nest had tumbled from its perch; various members of the Kingston Field Naturalists had taken shifts making sure predators would leave the youngster alone. Bare-chested—as was his preferred state—with binoculars slung around his neck, Doc was in his Happiest of Places.

He did not have many Happy Places. Raised in a family that did not appreciate his focus on intellectual pursuits nor his interest in exploring inner journeys, he was out-of-step with the fishing/boat-building rough ways of his father and brother and escaped early to live in a chattel house near Chalky Mount on the east coast of the island. Numerous women came and went, notably Alice Wise—who predeceased him earlier this year (a wonderful, loving, bookish woman, she and I had many long conversations although we never met in person)—and his gorgeous first wife, Judy Weiss, who brought their daughter, Naomi, into the world.

He was a negligent young husband and father, too preoccupied in struggles with his impulses and the always-hovering darkness of depression, to show up for his family. On our first date in the summer of 1985 in Barbados, where I was working on a major retail project, his eight-year-old daughter joined us on a sailing adventure where she and I became fast friends. It became evident that my stable ways (call them boring, if you wish) and secure employment made it easy for Judy to allow Naomi to visit us, made much more fun when my eleven-year-old son, Dan, joined in.

The Black Dog was a decades-long challenge for Doc. By 1989, when this photo was taken, I knew that this posture, this scene, meant that tumult, shouting, and stormy silences would inhabit our lives for another three- to four-month stint. The glass contains gin, always a harbinger of the worst to come.

My first husband, Terry, and I had a cool-not-stormy relationship, perhaps warmly distant would best describe it. When I met Doc I had no way of knowing that I had come under the spell of the Exotic Other, and I offered no resistance to his love bombing. He moved into my home without invitation and I was swept up into being the rescuer of someone Badly Understood. A romantic notion and a cautionary tale for others.

A year later, once it was time for me to return to Canada, I consulted with the High Commission in Barbados only to be told that Doc did not have sufficient points to be allowed entry and that marriage would be the only way for him to travel with me. Our children, his mother, and two close friends attended our quick ceremony conducted in a judge’s chambers; two days later we were on our way to Toronto.

We settled for a year in Toronto and then made our way to Kingston, where I became a marketing professor and he kept house and took an evening course at Queen’s University. He was delighted by our proximity to the lakes and conservation centres north of the city and the ample terrain to explore.

We made new friends, got to know some of his professors, began to fix up a falling-down farmhouse, and brought his daughter north for several visits. We travelled in the summer months, had vacations in the tropics each winter, and built a solid life together. We were intellectual equals, feistily disagreeing about many subjects; long-time jazz fans, we shared our favourites and expanded each other’s repertoires. We both appreciated tidiness and order in the house and our gardens were filled with native plants. Weekends always included birding activities and time in our separate studies working on course work—me as prep for the courses I was teaching and he as prep for the courses he was taking.

The year 1992 saw us settle in St. Lucia for my development project. In the 13 years away from Barbados, here he was most at home.

Doc in his study at Morne Beausejour in St. Lucia, studying up on birds, enjoying strong coffee and many cigarettes.

Doc releasing a gull which we had rescued and nursed back to health. Near the Maria Islands in the southern part of St. Lucia.

Doc walking towards Mr. Wally’s house, behind God’s back not too far from Petit Piton in St. Lucia. Mr. Wally grew the best mangoes and shared his modest home with the most beautiful and skittish Ginger kitten, Minou.

By the late 90s, Doc completed first an undergraduate degree and then a Masters in Geography, both at Queen’s University. My contribution was to fund all of the above, type and edit every single document he wrote, and to keep up his spirits. His contributions to our household included some cooking, as little house cleaning as possible, and during his masters’ studies, parts of his payment as a teaching assistant. Far too meager a contribution for me. Once he had completed his Masters degree his arrogance would not allow him to work at “just any shite job” and he wanted me to fund yet another five years of study so that he could earn a doctorate. I had reached the end of my patience.

In the fall of 2000 he was back in Barbados trying to find his way once more. Lucky enough to once again meet a wonderful woman, he partnered with Renata, a terrific Earth Mother, who shared his love of birds, the natural world, and living outside as much as possible. Not long after she was able to find him work at Graeme Hall, he would ruin that relationship too. I will say no more as her story is not mine to tell. I will add, however, that Renata is now one of my closest friends.

From then, he lived in a series of homes always shared with at least one dog, his now preferred companions. They offered the understanding, unwavering devotion, and adoration he always craved. At the end of his life, when he knew he was dying, his sole concern was that his beloved dogs would be provided for in loving homes.

With Wolfson at Hothersal in 2010, his home where I remained a welcome visitor long after our divorce. I spent a week here right after my mother’s death from Alzheimer’s where Doc and I explored the huge antipathy between the two of them. We resolved nothing.

His most important work was—working with others—establishing Woodbourne Shorebird Trust Reserve. Funded by various wildlife organizations, Doc made sure the grasses were kept low, ensured the water levels remained attractive to shorebirds, kept meticulous notes about species counts, and worked with shooting swamps to try to reduce the number of birds killed for ‘sport.’

The gifts that Doc offered to me included heightening my awareness of birds and their role as ‘canaries in the coal mine’, sharing my love of great music and good books, and introducing me to other Bajans, who still play an important role in my life. Above, you can see a straight line between Doc and Renata and me. Doc’s cousins, Maurice Burke and Ann (Burke) Gale, are long-time friends and fellow aficionados of horses and horse racing. Equally, Liz Stewart, Doc’s girlhood friend, is still my friend, nearly 40 years on. Liz introduced me to her mum, Janice, and through Janice I met her brother, John Chandler, my beloved partner of the last twelve years.

My last encounters with Doc, earlier this year, were fraught with his usual anger, disappointment, and desire for control. I pushed back, said what I had to say, and understood that was also goodbye. Doc did not believe in heaven nor in an afterlife but he did believe in augury and both Renata and I have already seen signs from the birds.