GABE WYNNE-JONES

Tragically on Monday, March 7, 2005, as the result of a car accident, Gabe was taken from his loving family. He did not suffer. Gabe was the treasured son of Elizabeth Collins (Mark O'Reilly) and Phil Wynne-Jones (Bev).

He was the dearly loved brother of Josh (JW-Jones) and cherished grandson of Evalyn Collins and the late Kenneth F. Collins and the late Wynne and Sheila B. Wynne-Jones.

He was the godson of John Baird and Wendy Wynne-Jones. Gabe will be missed terribly by many uncles, aunts and cousins.

Friends may visit at the Central Chapel of Hulse, Playfair & McGarry...315 McLeod Street, 613-233-1143, Ottawa, ON, Canada.

My brother Gabe...

Gabe was the most genuine person you'll ever meet. Everybody loved him. I can say with confidence, that there is not one single person in the world that didn't like Gabe.

This is a brother that would have walked to the moon for me if I asked him to, luckily I didn't, because I would have missed him while he took off on his adventure.

Representing his favourite things with one of many Ottawa Senators hats, and a Blue Skies Music Festival shirt, he had a smile that could light up any room... a smile that had the power to draw you to him.

This is exactly what Gabe wanted, to bring you into his world of happiness, so he could then do anything possible to fill your world with happiness too.

He only saw the good in people. Some might have said he was a little too trusting, but looking at it now, I think that is a beautiful quality to have.

He would walk a mile, maybe two miles, maybe twenty two miles in someone's shoes before judging them. No, I'm sorry... even then, he still wouldn't judge them.

--

Oh, but anyone that knew Gabe knows he suuure could talk!!! There is nobody on the planet with as much to say as Gabe did. He'd recap his whole day at work, maybe even the last week at work!

He would play out an episode of a reality TV show, sing the lyrics to a song, or one pass on one of his hundreds of random facts. I used to call them useless facts, but I don't think they are so useless anymore.

There was little time for the use of a comma with Gabe, because he had so much he wanted to say. He'd talk your ear off, but if you didn't tell him to stop, he would assume you were as interested in everything he had to say, as he was in sharing it.

That's Gabe for ya, he didn't care what people thought. He also didn't really take advice either! He would listen, and take it in, but then he'd kindly remind you that he wanted to learn things on his own. I had a hard time accepting that, so I gave him advice anyway!

Maybe too much, but I was always just trying to look out for what was in his best interest. His philosophy worked for him though, and he was content with it.

Like Wayne Gretzky says, you miss one hundred percent of the shots you don't take.

--

One night, I was speaking with a friend of ours, and they told me about this trip Gabe had been planning. He hadn't told me about it, and suddenly was leaving in a few days.

Since he didn't have much luck in either of the music business courses he took in College, he needed to find himself.

Alone in a rental car, mostly staying in hostels or even the car itself, he went from Toronto all the way down to Florida, then through the southern states to California, up to Vancouver, and over to Victoria to visit our cousins.

In Nashville, he stood on the stage of the Grand Ole Opry. In Memphis, he visited Sun Studios and touched the microphone used by Elvis Presley. In Waco, TX he visited the home of his favourite pop - Dr.Pepper. In Las Vegas he stayed in a cheap hotel and visited some casinos. I'm not sure about Gabe, but I call it "the big trip".

Unfortunately, on Feb 19th, exactly a year after my grandfathers passing, Gabe's trip came to an end; he had a bit of a car accident and had to fly home.

His sense of adventure and care-free mentality allowed him to experience more in a one month trip than some do in a lifetime.

I have to admit trying to talk him out of it before hand, but looking back, it brought him so much happiness, and again I am reminded that money is not real. "The big trip" was real.

--

Our Nanny Sheila passed away just eight days prior to Gabe, and her funeral was held yesterday in Perth. I would like to tell you about an old picture I saw that took my breath away. It was my whole Wynne-Jones family, with all of our uncles, aunts and cousins, over 25 people in the picture.

Right up there, front row centre stands my beautiful Nanny Sheila, smiling away, with both of her hands on Gabe's shoulders. Almost as if this is exactly how things were to happen, and they were meant to be together at this time.

I would like to think they are enjoying a cup of tea and a French vanilla cappuccino together right now.

--

Gabe touched more lives than I had ever imagined for such a young man. I've had over 150 e-mails alone since the tragic news traveled all over the world.

Many of them express the way he used to look up to me, and tell everyone about my band, and more recently, my new family.

Gabe's girlfriend wrote "the person he talked about the most was you. I think I knew almost everything about you after a week of talking to him. You were his most favourite person in the world; he was so honoured and proud to call you his brother."

I cry constantly reading these messages.

I knew he looked up to me a bit, cause I was his big brother, but the truth is, he is more of a role model to me than I could be to anyone. I am proud of the person he became... a true hero.

I should have told him this, but now it's too late. I should be more like Gabe; in fact, we all should. No judgments, no hate. Just love, kindness, helpfulness, thoughtfulness, charm, honesty, "good times", and most of all we could all use a smile like his.

There is too much hate in the world, and that is what I am taking from this. There is no time for it.

A friend in Texas wrote... "life is a very fragile and temporary thing. I think it is very important to live with no reservations of who we are, what we are, and who we care about and love. It is very important to let those that we do love know it, and to show them love without reservation. Love is never a bad thing."

--

My girlfriend Vanessa, and her kids Jack and Bethany are moving here from Australia at the end of the month. After a few phone conversations with Gabe, the kids couldn't wait to meet him. Now they are not going to meet their uncle. I know the feeling; I also didn't meet one of my uncles, who was also taken from us too early.

As much as it is the lives he has touched, it is also the lives he had yet to touch.

--

My final story for you today...

Gabe was always excited to tell me about his karaoke songs, and that he recently sang songs by Ray Charles, and a song called "Tuff Enuff" by a friend of ours, Kim Wilson, of the Fabulous Thunderbirds. He was always trying to impress me.

Just over a week ago, Gabe was full of energy, bursting to tell me that he sang "Blue Monday" down at O'Briens.

It's Kim Wilson that sings the classic "Blue Monday" on our most recent album, you'll hear that in just a minute.

Well, a few days later, I got into my grandmas car, and our CD was playing. Strange, I thought, but I guess Nanny was showing one of her friends our music. Can you picture them rocking out to the music in the car?

I went in later and asked her why she'd been listening to it. She said she wasn't.

I guess it was Gabe, practicing to "Blue Monday" so he could go in and really nail it at Karaoke the first chance he'd get.

He was taken from us... on a Monday.

On Monday night an angel was called back home, and now he is truly in a better place.

As the first line says "Blue Monday, oh how I hate Blue Monday..."

This is dedicated to Gabe, a hero to all of us...

Phil and Liz named their boys after two horn players. Two really good horn players. Joshua who brought down the walls of Jericho (and quite a few night club walls around North America.) And the Archangel Gabriel who plays first trumpet in God’s heavenly house band. Neither of the Wynne-Jones boys ended up actually playing a wind instrument, but there was one horn Gabe never tired of blowing. He never tired of blowing the horn for his big brother Joshua.

A little while back, when JW took a Maple Blues Award, it was Gabe who was kind and considerate enough to alert Doc and Woody at “Chez 106.” This is Gabe the promoter we’re talking about, and when it came to promoting the JW Jones Band, he was tireless. So he passed on to Doc and Woody the name of the hotel and the room number in Toronto where Josh could be reached so that they could give him a call – pass on their congratulations -- early the morning after the Awards Ceremony. Really early. Josh, needless to say, was glad of the media attention and more than happy to do a radio interview in the dark of predawn! Professional that he is, I’m sure he’d gotten to bed good and early the night before.

The Angel Gabriel, apart from blowing first trumpet in the heavenly house band, is a messenger, the bringer of good news. And he is famous also, as a comforter. The Bible isn’t clear on this point but you’ve got to think Mary must have been pretty confused when this big winged guy appears in the house and tells her she’s going to bear the Savior of Mankind. I mean this kind of thing didn’t happen all that often. Gabe probably had to talk her through it. She must have been frightened. Gabe would have had to reassure her, listen to her and be there totally for her. That’s what our Gabe would have done, anyway. His famous namesake was the angel who came to Jesus in his agony in the Garden of Gethsemane. He was a comforter, a shoulder to cry on, someone who could cheer you up. Sounds like Gabe, all right.

I’m going to stretch this heavenly comparison one more notch. The angel Gabriel along with his sidekick Michael have the reputation of being the heavenly bouncers. They’re the ones who stand at the doors of a church to check your ID bracelet and make sure you’re not the Devil incarnate. Well, Gabe, clearly, was no bouncer. He wasn’t into conflict or confrontation -- didn’t have a mean bone in his body. But he was a guardian, nonetheless. He worked security at Blue Skies, the summer music festival up the road apiece, where he and Josh have been going since they were babies. Gabe got involved in Blue Skies in a big way and joined the security team because, when you care about something, when you enjoy something, you want to make sure everyone gets a chance to enjoy it. That’s the kind of person Gabe was. A behind the scenes kind of guy, making sure everyone was happy and things were running smoothly.

Obviously, if you’re in security – even at Blue Skies – issues are going to crop up now and then, but Gabe never, never lost his cool. Alison, the head of security, was telling me the other day that Gabe could get along with anyone. His biggest weapon was his smile. Maybe he was so good at the job because, as it says in his obituary notice, Gabe saw the goodness in everybody.

Yesterday I read the eulogy at my mum’s memorial service. Gabe’s Nanny Sheila. It was a sad occasion, to be sure, but more of a celebration, really, of a life well lived. Afterwards, the family came back to the house and there was a wonderful party with much laughter and remembering. All of Gabe’s Wynne-Jones aunts and uncles were there and most of his many cousins. It was a good time, except, when you remembered. With your eyes closed you could hear whose laughter was not there. Nobody wanted the party to end because when it did, there was nothing to do but cry.

Where, God help me, are we to find any joy in this ceremony today? Let’s face it -- none of us really wants to be here. And yet there is nowhere else in the world we want to be. Nanny Sheila was 88 years old; Gabe was exactly a quarter her age. But I said “well lived” when I was talking about Nanny Sheila’s life and that has nothing to do with time, really, does it. It’s about what you do with what time you’ve got. It’s about how much you put into the moment. It’s about the giving and the taking of happiness; it about smiling. Gabriel’s life was not near long enough but man did he get good smileage out of it. And if there is no joy we can get out of the actual ceremony, let us get as much joy as we can out of this gathering. We loved Gabe and were fortunate enough to have been loved by him. I hope it turns out that Lennon and McCartney were right when they said all you need is love. But for the next little while it’s going to be hard to believe.

"I thought it would be nice to include this because she had the
great pleasure of spending his last couple of days with him.
Lindsay is such a sweet girl, and made him so happy, so it was
an excellent way for him to spend his last moments down here
before moving on to something bigger, and hopefully, better!" - JW

Well first I'd like to start off telling you how Gabe's last days were. The Sunday he came down he had a mandolin lesson at 2:30pm; he was excited to learn how to play it. But when he got to the place he found out the guy that was supposed to be teaching him had already left for the day.

So he headed to the airport to get the car to come down and visit me and Emma (her 11 month old baby girl). When he was talking to me earlier he asked me what kind of car he should get and I told him "a blue one", because my favourite colour is blue. He called me around 4:00pm to tell me he was leaving Ottawa. He showed up at my house a few hours later with a blue car! lol (laugh out loud)

A couple of hours went by and we realized that we hadn't eaten yet so we just decided to get Subway because it was too late to cook anything. My sister went with him to get supper while i stayed home with Emma. We ate supper and watched Freaks and Geeks. Gabe brought the complete series down the last time he visited me and got me hooked on it so he left it here for me to watch it all. By the time everyone went to sleep it was really late so we decided to wait until morning to watch "Ray" and just watched "Great Balls Of Fire" because we had both seen it before just in case we fell asleep.

We watched the movie and fell asleep in each others arms. We woke up the next morning to Emma making noises and smiling at us. We got up and put Elmo on for her because it's her favourite show. We spent the rest of the time talking and laughing. We talked about how our lives were and what we wanted to do to change them. Well, 3:30pm came around and I had a tanning appointment at 4:00pm. I told him it was up to him whether he wanted to stay for a while longer or not. My friend was coming over later that evening whom I hadn't seen in a while because she has been away at school, so Gabe, being the complete sweetheart he was, decided he would just drop me off at my tanning appointment and go home so that my friend and I could catch up and he could make it home in time to watch American Idol. He dropped me off at my appointment and told me that he didn't know when he would be down next but he had Emma's birthday weekend booked off so he could come to her party and then baby-sit for you and your girlfriend the next night because you were going to see B.B. King. I told him that sounded good, I gave him a kiss, said goodbye and left, he drove off.

Gabe told me his favourite sub from subway was chicken and meatball sauce ("not the big pieces of chicken, the little cubes" he said lol) He told me his favourite movie was "The Score". He never told me what his favourite song was but I know he loved country and blues music. He loved his job and always told me stories about what had happened at work that day when he'd call me every night. He said he loved talking on the phone and we'd talk for hours every single night....not a night went by that I didn't hear from him. Even if he was going out he'd always make a point to call me to find out how my day was.

He told me that the music festival "Blue Skies" was his life and he looked forward to it every year. He asked me if I wanted to go with him this year because he wanted to share it with me. He told me stories about what had happened there previous years. He wanted to take me to hear you play because he was so proud of you. He had your music playing on one of his online profile and always boasted "that's my brother" lol.

He would tell me that you were giving him a hard time about me but he never seemed angry about it... he knew that you were just looking out for him and you loved him. Even the day you talked to him when he was at my house he told me what had happened with your conversation but he wasn't angry about it; he just kind of laughed saying it was just a misunderstanding and that you had asked about Emma.

He loved reality shows including American Idol, Survivor and Amazing Race and insisted I watched them so we could talk about them afterwards during our phone conversations. He loved the show Fear Factor and he liked to watch infomercials (which I thought was hilarious because i like watching them too and haven't met anyone until him that does) We had so much in common it's scary. I joked with him one night telling him we must be soul mates because we liked most of the same things and I had never met any guy before that did. I've been dealing with a lot of bad things lately including my parents fighting with me about my future and dealing with Emma's father, and Gabe was always there to comfort me whether it was in person, on the phone or just talking over msn and he'd always make me laugh and cheer me up when I was feeling down.

On February 13th we were on the phone talking and a conversation came up about how the next day was Valentines Day and neither of us had a valentine. We just jokingly decided to be each other's valentines. Well the next day, and without knowing it, flowers arrived at my door from guess who......! He sent me a bouquet of coloured flowers and one single white rose which I dried up and still have. I was so excited because no one had ever sent me flowers before. I told Gabe that when he called me that night and he said he couldn't believe it, but was happy that he was the first.

We shared stories about our past and talked about our grandparents. I told him about my nana that passed away with lung cancer 15 years ago and how I still cried for her and he told me about his grandfather that had passed away 2 years ago and how he missed him more than anything. I remember he would sing constantly whether it was a commercial on TV, or just a song in his head... lol! He was obsessed with karaoke and would go every chance he got.

When he was at my house we never really went out and did anything, we just stayed home enjoying each other's company. He'd always try to get me to have pillow fights with him and that's how he'd wake me up in the morning lol. He was always playing with Emma and picking her up and cuddling with her (or trying to....she's really squirmy!) which really impressed me a lot. He would let me vent to him about stuff that Emma's dad had done or said to me that upset me or made me mad and he always listened and made me feel better.

He told me he loved French Vanilla Cappuccino and only liked drinking coffee when it was cold. He also loved pop and his favourite was Dr. Pepper.

When I was talking to him on the computer one night, I went to talk to my mom about something and came across a book that had your last name on it. It's called "The Maestro". I asked him about it and that's when he told me that your uncle was an award winning writer. He told me that there was a character in the book named Gabriel and that I should read it because it is really good.

He sent me all kinds of pictures of him, your family, your band, and his trip across the U.S. He even sent me a pic of you and him as kids! He sent me pics of Rockefeller Center in New York where he visited during his trip. I told him I was jealous and that I have always wanted to go there around Christmas time to see the tree. He told me that if we were still together next Christmas he would take me there to see it.

He told me he had taken one of his friends to Canada's Wonderland for her birthday because she wanted the funnel cake there... that's all she wanted to go for! He told me it wasn't good, so i laughed and told him that he was crazy and it was the best thing ever....and then I think he hit me with a pillow... lol!

But the person he talked about the most was you. I think I knew almost everything about you after a week of talking to him. You were his most favourite person in the world; he was so honoured and proud to call you his brother.

But just remember... he died happy... the last time I saw him, he was full of smiles...and looked like he didn't have a care in the world.

If I can think of anything else, I'll be sure to let you know :)

I hope this helps,

Lindsay

The Dance

(click here to download)

Garth Brooks
(written by: Tony Arata)

Gabe's favourite song. It was played at the funeral service.

Looking back on the memory of
The dance we shared 'neath the stars alone
For a moment all the world was right
How could I have known that you'd ever say goodbye

And now I'm glad I didn't know
The way it all would end the way it all would go
Our lives are better left to chance I could have missed the pain
But I'd of had to miss the dance

Holding you I held everything
For a moment wasn't I a king
But if I'd only known how the king would fall
Hey who's to say you know I might have chanced it all

And now I'm glad I didn't know
The way it all would end the way it all would go
Our lives are better left to chance I could have missed the pain
But I'd of had to miss the dance

Yes my life is better left to chance
I could have missed the pain but I'd of had to miss the dance

MEMORIES