In Memoriam - Josef Stavroff
August 17, 1942 - January 19, 2005
Former Chief Steward for OPSEU Local 560

A Tribute Delivered at the Funeral of Josef Stavroff - Saturday January 22, 2005
by Ted Montgomery, President, OPSEU Local 560

Josef was a great lover. It was plain to see the moment you got to know him – as obvious as his hearty laugh, his appetites for food, for fellowship, for family. When he smiled, he not only shared his joy, he raised yours.

I loved to eat with Joe, because he loved to eat…It wasn't that he ate too much, but that he so thoroughly enjoyed his food, enjoyed the variety, the experimentation, the flavours, the preparing, and most of all the sharing. Josef was a great sharer.

He was a great friend to his colleagues in teaching and in the union. He was a great friend to me. Let me share with you some things most of you probably don't know about our relationship. When I needed important advice I always turned to Josef. He told me more than once that I was smarter than he was, and that he had great faith and trust in me. I knew that he had something in which I placed even more faith and trust. You see, I could figure things out. Josef knew in his heart what was right. His heart was his foundation. I have relied on it for over 25 years and he shared it with me freely, willingly, and gladly. I shall be eternally grateful.

There is a cliché at services like these that we should feel lucky to have spent what time we have had with the one we've lost. It is true, and I have focused on how truly lucky Seneca, the union, and I have been to have known Josef. And I also miss him terribly and, like you, am profoundly saddened to lose him.

Josef loved the fellowship of his colleagues. He knew how important it is to stand up for what is right, to stand up with and for teachers. That's why he joined the leadership of Local 560. He loved teaching, valued it, treasured and cherished it. He never let his students down and never let his colleagues down. He gave his best and remained true to his principles.

Josef poured his heart into everything he did.

Josef's heart was his foundation. He shared it with so many of us. He gave his heart to his music, his pottery, his union, his teaching, his family. The biomechanics of his heart may have betrayed him this week -- the spirit, and soul, and essence of it never did.

Josef loved his music -- his tastes were eclectic and as broad as his imagination would take him – from the Ukrainian dance troop of his younger days to the fm jazz and classics that accompanied him through his time at work, marking papers, preparing lessons, studying his Collective Agreement. The rhythm of his heart was echoed in the rhythms of that music.

That the Great Teacher Seminars which Josef loved and helped to organize were for teachers and teachers alone was special to Josef. He was not a teacher by happenstance, or because it was a way to earn a living, or to support a family. He was a teacher because he was made for it. Just ask his students. He knew how important learning was in their lives even when they didn't – and when they didn't, he led them to discover and learn that truth.

There was a time when Josef devoted himself to photography. His subjects revealed themselves to him. His openness opened them to him and through him to the whole bright, full, beautiful, and splendid world.

Pottery -- Josef didn't make pots with his hands. He made them with his heart. You can see it in his creations. You could hear it in his voice when he talked of his pottery and the co-op. You could feel it, know it, and bask or even rejoice in sharing his joy.

And of all these cultural things – most of all – Josef loved words, written, spoken, prosaic or poetic, sung or whispered, he loved the language. He loved his books and his short stories. He loved the magic of a finely woven tale, the way the words could move you to laughter, tears, terror, or joy. He could read. I don't mean just integrate and analyse, parse and deconstruct. I mean he could appreciate the beauty of the art, as he became one with it. He could see that beauty in the language that surrounds us.

I used to test all my speeches by sharing them first with Joe. The hardest part of writing this speech for Josef was finding the humour that I know he would have insisted be included.

Each year, for some time now, Joseph and I have shared many long, sometimes nearly pee-your-pants kind of laughs over the entries for the Bulwer Lytton Awards. These go to putative opening lines of novels never written. Bulwer Lytton was the 19th Century author who began one work with … “It was a dark and stormy night.” Man – sometimes we would roar. I so loved sharing those times with Joe. He and I did not get to share those laughs this year. But I want to share with you a couple that we would have shared when we had the chance this year. I want to do that so that we all can hear, in our memories, his laughter once again:

I know Joe would have enjoyed these:

As Amy reached for the envelope her heart fluttered in anticipation like the wings of a fruit bat that has eaten a fermented peach, and even though she knew the statistic that you are more likely to be hit by a meteorite than to win the lottery, she was still quite surprised when opening the envelope to be hit by a meteorite.

She sipped her latte gracefully, unaware of the milk foam droplets building on her mustache, which was not the peachy-fine baby fuzz that Nordic girls might have, but a really dense, dark, hirsute lip-lining row of fur common to southern Mediterranean ladies nearing menopause, and winked at the obviously charmed Spaniard at the next table.

Stamp, stack, stamp, stack, stamp, stack, Rodney was going insane from the monotony of the job and the cruel irony of being guest of the New Hampshire penal system forced to read the words over and over: "Live Free or Die," "Live Free or Die," "Live Free or Die."

Her pendulous breasts swung first to the left, then to the right and finally in independent directions, much like semaphore signals, and although he couldn't understand semaphore, Kyle was sure they were saying, "Never ride the Tilt-A-Whirl with your grandma."

The union has lost a great champion. Josef and I fought many battles side by each other's side. I could have had no better ally. When he rose to the microphone at the OPSEU Convention, he always had the rapt attention of his union brothers and sisters, because they knew, when they heard him say in that resonant and powerful voice… “Josef Stavroff, Local 560” …that they were about to hear something important, something true, and something from a trade union heart. Josef was fearless when it came to the fight for college faculty. I was so proud to be his friend and union brother.

Like many of you, I delighted in watching Josef become a consummate family man. He shared his heart with all of us. He saved the best of it for, and gave the best of it to… his family. Josef loved nothing so much as his family.

No matter how much he gave you – You gave him more.

Sasha – Josef's precious jewel. You were a great joy to your Dad. There is so much of him in you. His innate sense of hospitality and caring for others. His determination and his unmatched integrity. You are like your Dad in more ways then I can count. And he loved you for those great qualities and for so much more. How proud he was of your efforts and your accomplishments. In his great heart, there was a special place for you Sasha. He cherished you so dearly and as you grow, those of us so lucky to know you will see your father in you, and will continue to love him and you.

Daniel. Your Dad was so enormously proud of your earnest and thoughtful nature. You too are like your father…you are his son. He would tell us of what you were doing, never in a boastful way, but in a way that we could see in his eyes you meant the world to him. We could see it in a way that told us he loved not only what you had been but even more what you were becoming. He was so thrilled to be a part of, and to be a guide to your becoming a toddler, then a boy, and now a young man. Your strength, your curiosity, the way you pour yourself into life is a credit not only to you but to your father as well. I know that one day you will wrap your arms around people and embrace them with that same warmth as did your Dad, sharing your strength, and kindness, and love for life just the way he did. You will fill the room with your presence as he did, not in a spotlight but in an incandescence that brightens everyone around you. You are his son. He was so proud of that fact. He was so proud to be your Dad.

Leslie Ann. Josef saw in you the sweetness of your mother. He loved that side of her and he loved how it was further manifested, even magnified in you. He watched you grow, joining him for a time at Seneca as a student. He loved how you and your mother shared life's adventures. Josef and I often talked of daughters, my two being each a little older and a little younger than you. The pleasure your dad took just in being your dad was palpable. He loved having a family more than anyone I know, and you were perfect for him, not that he was blind to your imperfections, simply that they were utterly unimportant. He held you so close in his heart not out of any fears or worries but just because he loved you so. He saw the sweetness in you and he adored you for that and for so much more.

Jason. Boy did we talk about you! When you sowed your wild oats a bit more broadly than most teenage boys, your Dad was there, reached out with his heart and embraced you to him. Most dads tolerate the rascals their teenage boys can be. Your dad didn't just tolerate, he accepted it. Accepted and loved you – not just some blind so-called unconditional love, but an understanding acceptance of what you were, what you are and what you could, and will, be. Your father never lost sight of the role he could play in your life and the role you played in his. You fulfilled him in so many ways, Jason, through thick and thin, through storms and bright sunshine, you enabled Josef to be a father and that was a role he was born for, that he treasured and loved with all of his splendid heart.

Josef and I used to talk of our enjoyment of Japanese cinema. In Korusawa's Dodeskaden, a father of 8 or 9 children is asked by one – which of them he loves best? He answers – whichever is nearest to him at that moment. Josef wanted each of you near to him all the time. His heart embraced you all.

Sharon . I knew Joe before he met you and after you married. In the film, As Good As It Gets, Jack Nicholson tells Helen Hunt: “You make me want to be a better man.” Sharon – You made Josef a better man. It was a common event for us to be at a union meeting needing one more person to have the necessary quorum and knowing that Joe had told us he would be late. Now, Joe was not one of those people unable to be punctual – not at all. He always had some excuse to be late for our meetings. He wife was making him do something or other – just like she had him rub her feet every night. For some, “henpecked” might come to mind. NOPE – It was just love – Josef loved his wife and he loved his family and nothing, nothing , was ever more important that that. Josef's love for Sharon has been shining, bright, and uplifting – not to just them – but to all of us who saw it and shared it. His death will not end that love, it will last forever in Sharon and in their family. Sharon – thank you. You made Josef so happy in so many ways.

Goodbye my dear friend.

We began the day with song.

One of the traditions of the union movement is to join together in song. I want to invite some of Josef's friends in the union to join me in celebrating his life with a song today. It is one Joe and I used to sing together, and I hope that you can all join us in singing: Joe Hill .