By Judith Cameron

In what may have seemed like a bit of serendipity, the painting began with an innocent comment in his youth. While working out west for the CPR he regretted in a letter home his inability to capture the beauty of the Rockies by painting. Presto!

A paint box set arrived from mom and dad. This may seem incidental, but it speaks volumes to the degree of curiosity and the respect for it firmly entrenched in the young McMurtry's family. The man himself today has enough sense of wonder in him to match a school of young children. It is one of the many joys of being in his presence, to say nothing of the privilege of leisurely viewing his glorious sensuous paintings, basking in his fascinating conversation. After accepting a graciously extended invitation by the Chief and his wife Ria to their home for a follow up to a meeting at his office, I found myself selfishly simply not wanting to leave. I could have stayed for hours just drinking in his elegant lush works of art and continuing our conversation.

I asked him about his younger days and this desire to learn which some today find singularly absent. It's a wonderful story of the young love between his parents Elizabeth and Roy who married when the lovely Elizabeth was only seventeen and Roy Sr., considerably older, was just starting out in law. Elizabeth gave birth to the Chief Justice at nineteen. His favourite photograph of her shows a delicate tender young woman with a face of Dresden china, truly a great beauty. On her lap is a positively gleeful, robust rather chubby baby Roy. The child certainly is father to the man, for although the chubbiness is gone and he is extremely fit and very attractive at seventy-two, he emanates that same eagerness and buoyant passion today. He is a rare man, rich in sensitivity, complex in nature, and unpretentious beyond words.

The Chief's father, a very successful respected lawyer devoted his time to the law, to the exclusion of practically all else, says the Chief. Having never had the opportunity herself to advance her education formally, his mother, an avid historian, was forever reading and simultaneously raising four sons, even going on to write some pretty fine poetry. The creative DNA loomed large in the Chief's mother and she obviously had a profound influence upon him. When the Chief Justice speaks of her now (she is still alive in her nineties but tragically in her dark final days) he is brimming with enthusiasm about her, filled with both love and wonder at her very full account in life. This ability to remain positive is in itself a special gift, when one has been blessed with a mother so loving and extraordinary.

Elizabeth McMurtry seized life with a vengeance when she began university at the age of fifty and never stopped until she was sixty-five! She also spent ten splendid years living with Roy and Ria and was nothing less than a sheer delight of inspiration for them and their six children. Not every mother and daughter-in-law co-exist in such harmony, the Chief says, but the chemistry between his mother and Ria was remarkable and genuine.

In a sorrowful blow to the family, Roy Sr. had been the victim of a massive stroke at the young age of fifty-three and never recovered, dying in 1964.

Raising a large family and getting himself established in law gave the Chief little time to pursue the desire to paint. A breakthrough came in the summer of 1987 when he and Ria exchanged homes with Governor General Adrienne Clarkson. The McMurtrys toddled off to the south of France while Clarkson and her partner John Ralston Saul merrily moved into the McMurtry cottage in Muskoka. In France, Roy had the luxury of painting every day for thirty days. When he tells me of this gift of time I sense that he remembers each one of those days.

Many of his paintings from France grace the walls of both his office and his home. They are vibrant and textured with the colours one associates with the best of the impressionists like Monet, whom the Chief considers to be a giant in his field.

Exquisite portraits of Swiss cottages near Neuchatel, and a stunning painting of Clarkson's home in hues of those irresistible french blues, yellows and ochres nestle among some of his earliest works done at Georgian Bay. He, himself, is not as fond of these first works while I find their wide open skies at dusk haunting, fully capturing my own fond memories.

The Chief Justice is highly critical of his own work, so much so that when I ask what his wish would be in the world of art, he immediately bursts forth "to be a better painter!" My jaw drops, for, in my limited but keen lifelong study of art, McMurtry's work is first class, definitely deserving a gallery of its own. It's well known that Winston Churchill could have made a decent living just painting more of the fine works he did. I think McMurtry ranks in that category, though he'd be first to deny it with his irrepressible modesty. There's that unpretentiousness again!

He goes on to say he believes he should be bolder with his colours, more adventurous, and he thinks he's too conservative.

The colours I see make me want to dance and sing and run through sunny fields of wildflowers.
His sense of painting, he says, is much more emotional than it is cerebral. Van Gogh is certainly one of his great loves, along with the impressionists, but Gauguin is the artist of whom he is very much in awe. His problem is with the human figure, he says, while I humbly encourage him to work at it, having no doubt that after what I've seen, he could achieve absolutely anything. This man has accomplished more in his life with what he still calls a hobby, than most of us can claim in our entire careers.

The Chief's parents instilled in him a deep appreciation for privilege, living by the motto that "to whom much is given much is expected".  Reflecting this, McMurtry quietly donates around ten paintings a year for silent auctions at charities like feed the hungry, and more recently the Stephen Lewis foundation for Africa.

The Nobel winning writer Elie Wiesel has said that a person's character can de defined by their gratitude. When I ask Chief Justice McMurtry what he is grateful for he comes forth with having had two great mentors, his father and the late outstanding lawyer Arthur Maloney. Friends mean much to him. He and Ria have many strong enduring friendships and they have worked hard at those through the years. These friendships are eclectic, to say the least. The evening before our meeting he and Ria had had an annual dinner with Bob Rae, Bill Davis and Oscar Peterson. I was moved when he told me that every Christmas Eve he has a brief personal one on one with Peterson. Believing firmly that luck plays a big role in life, the Chief says he "has enjoyed more than his share of luck" in his own life, with so many special opportunities and what he says has been more good luck than good management.

He is unspeakably proud of and grateful for his own six children and his ten grandchildren, who now range from three to seventeen. They are without doubt the light of his very full life and his devotion to them and their welfare is touching to witness. He expresses some trepidation about the divide between young males and females today and what he observes as the fascination bordering upon obsession young boys have with video games. He follows with interest everything he can about the latest research and reports on children in today's world.

The Chief has no ear for music, really, but Ria is an accomplished classical pianist. His spare time is a tug of war he says between painting and reading, with a piece of opera softly in the background. He has painted all over the world, in India, South America, Britain, France and all across Canada and is looking forward to a first trip to the Arctic in 2005. Any work resulting from that experience should be breathtaking. Count on it. But McMurtry says he could happily remain painting in Canada for the rest of his life.

He has been recognized as a Nation builder by the Globe and Mail, and as noted has earned the esteem of his colleagues and friends. Toronto star writer, former lawyer, and editor of the globe and mail, Cameron Smith, thinks "McMurtry is one of the finest judges this country has ever had, largely because of his degree of sympathy and humanity." We Ontarians have much to be thankful for in a Chief Justice who, as his former executive assistant John Rowesome says, inspires everyone around him. He is a man, Rowesome says, who when he asks anything of anyone, always surpasses that request himself. Rowesome, himself no ordinary rogue, but a wonderfully colourful talented personality, claims that he has "never known a man as sensitive, visionary and eclectic as Roy McMurtry" he doesn't stop there, adding that not a day goes by without Rowesome's vision of the world being impacted by the Chief and what he regards as "the true blessing in life of having worked with him."

When I ask Chief McMurtry about his current state of mind he doesn't hesitate to tell me that he finds himself "profoundly depressed by the human misery in the world, especially for so many children."  He stresses that he hesitates to generalize, but he is "alarmed by the mean-spirited wealth in this country" and what he calls a "certain avariciousness growing in Canada" along with "a sense of entitlement." One can never be without hope, he says, and he is cautiously optimistic, with the emphasis on cautiously, when he sees the level of commitment to society in many young people.

While he believes in the human struggle, he points out that each of us must make a dent for the good. In his view, we all have a daily responsibility to contribute. Lowering his head, he softly says "every day is pay-back day." I am in the presence of a man full of grace.

Thank you Chief Justice. Bless us with more paintings will you? And may providence find them a home in a gallery for all of us to honour.