434 THE ADVOCATE
VOL. 78 PART 3 MAY 2020
False Creek ferry captains, the father and then son who did home repairs
for her for decades, her housekeeper, the concierges in her building, the list
goes on. She had many, many friends all over the world and kept in touch.
She formed groups of friends and met with them frequently: the Granville
Island coffee group, the Busy Hands church group, her Mahjong group, her
law clerks’ group, the staff of St. Augustine’s School, her grade 7 class reading
group, and likely many more.
As noted above, one of her groups was her law clerks’ group. MJP had 26
law clerks from September 1977 until June 2002, covering two generations
of law school graduates. I am her eighth law clerk (’84–’85). One day during
my clerkship, she informed me that she wanted me to organize a lunch with
her former law clerks. Six of the eight were able to attend on December 7,
1984, at the Law Courts Inn. She decided she would try to do this every year
with her then law clerk as the organizer. After 2002, Sandy Banister, Q.C.,
(’80–’81) organized all the rest of the annual lunches. The first four lunches
were held at restaurants and then MJP decided to host them on a Saturday
in her home, first at Langara Gardens and then in False Creek. She would
provide wine and plates, etc. and we would bring potluck. When Brook
Greenberg (’96–’97) organized the lunch in 1997 and brought his lemon tart,
no subsequent lunch could be held without it.
What happened at these lunches? We talked and laughed. We and she told
stories. She was interested in our families, our work, our kids. Legal and
judicial gossip was exchanged and, sometimes, someone needed advice
about a work problem (none of which was ever to leave the room). After
articles we had all gone separate ways: big firms, sole practices, private
practice, Crown counsel, corporate positions or outside law altogether, so
each had something to share. MJP travelled widely and so did many of us
as our practices and incomes grew, so we swapped travel tips and stories.
For many years, she only travelled business or first class, so her advice was
“when entering a plane, turn left!” At the end of each lunch she always
asked if we wanted to do this again. “Of course!” And we had a group photo.
For MJP’s 90th birthday, the law clerks hosted a party for her on April 22,
2018, which coincided with our 33rd law clerks’ lunch. She could not host
because of some renovation or repair in her home, so we held it at the home
of one of her law clerks from the 1980s, Tim Kwan (’86–’87), which meant
she had no hosting duties at all. We had pictures on posters of all of our past
lunches and marvelled at how young we had all been! While most photos
just record who was there, the one in 1998 had 16 of us clustered around
MJP’s much-enjoyed red BMW Z3 convertible sports car with MJP in the
driver’s seat (how she loved that car), and the one in 2011 had all of us in