Arturo E. Perlini

Sault Ste Marie, Ontario

March 26, 1931 – March 4, 2021

What follows is a tribute to our father. Our dad lived his life in possession and expression of our humanity’s greatest virtues: patience, sincerity, kindness, generosity, humility, justice, respect, honesty, loyalty, wisdom and love. He was a man without self-interest, always putting the concerns of others before his own. His disposition was that of a pensive, reflective and studied man; he read voraciously, wanting to learn more-and-more about this world that he was intimately tied-to. His childhood mastery of Latin and Greek (the root of much of the English language) enabled him to learn English, of which he became proficient; there were no books more often opened in our home than dictionaries. He became extraordinarily literate, which created opportunities such as hosting a local radio program and later becoming the President of the Marconi Society (1959). The latter earned him a seat to dine with Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillip (Duke of Edinburgh) on their visit to the Soo. His appetite for learning extended to the world-at-large. He watched and read the news with rapt attention and interest. In conversation, he listened intently to others in order to learn from them and about their life experiences. He knew that to be an interesting person, his penchant to be an interested person would be important. His interest and curiosity made him a very intelligent person and as such, he was constantly sought for his knowledge and wisdom. And while he made his living on his keen intellect, he made his life about forging meaningful human connections with others.

Born during the great depression, our Arturo’s beginnings were modest. He was raised in a small village on the Adriatic Coast, Cuccurano Fano (in the Province of Pesaro, Italy). As was the custom during that time, part of his education was in a school that was overseen by the local clergy (seminary); it’s focus was both intellectual and moral development, with an emphasis on service to others. WWII ravaged his community and country. In December 1949, at the age of 18 years, his family departed from the Port of Genoa for Canada, first arriving on the shores of Ellis Island and travelling by train to Sault Ste Marie Ontario. Like so many at that time, he left the familiar for the hope and opportunity in the new world.

Immigrants at that time developed cultural groups and the Italian community grew and provided support to one another. While this new country was different than his own, familiar cultural supports provided opportunities for work. For example, dad worked as a butcher at a downtown meat market (Palace Meats) and as an insurance agent for Metropolitan Life. Back then, life insurance sales took place at a one’s kitchen table. It was the kind of work that taught him many things, one of which is that he learned the name and location of every street in our city. For the last near-25 years of his working life, he was a field officer in the Federal Government of Canada, for its Income Security Programs. That work took him into many rural and remote areas of Northern Ontario, an experience which fostered his love of the natural beauty of the region.

For 52 years, dad helped so many in this community as a tax preparer. As he was not formally trained in commerce or taxation, we marvelled at his careful study of tax law and regulations ~ we came to learn that no less than Albert Einstein described income tax as “…the hardest thing in the world to understand.” He prepared taxes at a time when computers and software and calculators – or any technology – did not exist. His tools were a sharpened pencil, a pad-of-paper, his mathematical wits…and his mental storage of knowledge on tax regulations. Thereafter came hand-held (four-function) calculators, personal computers, tax software and the internet, which would allow him to access tax bulletins…and he mastered all of it. His daughter Anne shared his tax proficiencies, assisting him on her visits home during tax season. Following her return to the Soo, she became his successor and continued his important work serving our community’s seniors in both taxes and pensions. Anne would often tell dad that not a day would pass without an office-visitor asking her “Are you Arturo’s daughter?” and then recount moving stories about his kindness and benevolence to them.

Dad seemed to have an immense affinity and affection for nature. He loved to immerse himself within it. To be sure, where he grew up in Italy was a rural area surrounded by beautiful nature. Once arriving in Canada, he was awed by the magnificence of his new home. The splendor of the Canadian Shield and Lake Superior enchanted him. He purchased waterfront-land upon which a cottage was built in Goulais Bay, on Lake Superior. His affection for that cottage-on-the-lake grew inestimably over the years. His affinity had little to do with the physical structure or the cottage itself; instead, it was about what the cottage represented. It was a point of connection, a nexus representing a meaningful opportunity to gather his family and friends. As he saw the world far beyond himself, there was no other perspective in which he could see the inherent value of his cottage: connecting with loved ones. Whether surrounding a crackling fire or dinner table, or a walk on the shore or in the woods, our dad created a place and space to share what we all long for: joy, belonging and love. He savoured the breathtaking sight of sunsets, the sonorous sounds of waves-lapping, birds-chirping and winds-howling…the savory smell of the pine trees…the earthy taste of the wild raspberries. Somehow he knew that his place within this vast expanse of beauty and wonder, was infinitesimal. This sense of awe imbued him with a deep feeling of peace and tranquility. This was his heaven-on-earth ~ his place to rejuvenate, re-set and re-connect.

The portrait of this man – in fact, the portrait of any person – is as challenging to veritably capture by words, as by brushstrokes; after all, there is a depth and complexity of human character that defies description. Instead, our sense of others is a “felt-sense,” acquired through our shared experiences with them. And while our experiences of others are shaped by our own lens or perspective, there is a profound felt-sense of Arturo amongst those who met, knew or loved him. And the felt-sense is simply this: he was a good man…he was a very good man. And while our lives are impoverished by his loss, our lives have also been enriched for having known and loved him. And if there ever was a reasonable measure of a man, it’s that he made our world a little better by having been part of it.

Dad ~ we loved you throughout all of your days…and you will be loved throughout all of our days…