John William Breen

John "Jack" William Breen died May 7, 2015 at Nanaimo Regional General Hospital in his 79th year. He is survived by his wife, Barbara, sons and daughter-in-law Gregory, Michael and Adrienne, and much-loved grandchildren Lucas and Emily. He also leaves his brother-in-law and sister-in-law, Arthur and Mary Gail Wood of Calgary. John was predeceased by his infant daughter Shelley Anne, parents Jean and Howard Breen of Lethbridge, brother and sister-in-law Jim and Caleen Breen of Richmond, BC and sister Anne Krier of Delaware.

Cremation has taken place. No service by request.

"With all their eyes all creatures gaze into the Open. Only our eyes, as though turned in, on every side of it are turned about

like traps to circumvent its free outgoing. What is without we know from the face of animals alone, for even the youngest child we turn around and force to see the past as form and not that openness that lies so deep within the face of animals.

We have never, not for a single day, that pure space before us into which the flowers endlessly open:

Like a child, one of us will lose himself to it in the stillness and has to be shaken back. Or another will die and be it."

--Rainer Maria Rilke

And now I too shall gaze into the open !