G10: Lynda Dianne Shiels 1960 & Conway Raymond Pauls

I was born Lynda Diane Shiels, the 7th and youngest child of Betty & George Shiels on April 25th, 1960. I am “the baby” of the family. I was brought home from the hospital in Melita to the farm just outside of Napinka, Manitoba. It was a very small home. I remember no running water, an outhouse, 3 bedrooms (a girl’s room, boy’s room and my parents room), kitchen, living room and a very small pantry. It was pretty close quarters for 9 people when I think back on it but they were good memories. When I was very small I was painfully shy except around my family, when asked to speak I would hide and if I did, I would stutter uncontrollably. I remember Mom getting me to sing the words I wanted to say so I could get it out and eventually, by the time I started school I had learned to speak without stuttering most of the time.

We lived on the farm until I was 5 and moved into a house in Napinka. I started school at Napinka Elementary and attended there until grade VI. The other kids in the family were very good about having to look after me and I was very close to my eldest sister Rosemarie, affectionately called “Mosie” because I couldn’t pronounce the “R”. She left home when she was 17 and at the time I didn’t understand why. When I realized she wasn’t coming home I was devastated. Mosie was like my mother to me (because she always had to look after me) and I had great separation anxiety. I could barely talk to her on the phone without crying. I remember that first summer she was gone and I went to stay with her in Langruth. I met her soon to be husband Bud (the same time she did I think), at a dance that she had taken me to. After coming home I still missed my Mosie terribly but latched onto big sister Patty. We have warm memories of when I was little and she was always a great big sister. I remember all of my brothers teasing me a lot, not so much playing with me but tormenting me until I cried. I remember Mom telling me that if I didn’t cry, they wouldn’t tease me anymore, so I didn’t cry but got teased all the time anyway because of them trying to make me cry! It was fun anyway and they really helped develop my tenacious character. I remember my brothers being pretty generous too though, always buying treats for me and lord help anyone who was mean to me!

I was bused to Melita School in grade VI and attended Melita Collegiate until I graduated from high school in 1978. Melita was a big scary town to me at first. This was when I realized that we were “poor”. It took quite awhile to adjust. This first year at Melita school taught me how rich I was in many other ways and I was thankful for that. After that first year of discovering my own identity. I got a job as a waitress at a local restaurant and worked part time while going to school for three years. I really liked school and excelled. I was pretty heavily involved in just about every aspect of the school – yearbook, student council every year, sports etc. I would have liked to go on to University but knew it was financially impossible and I wasn’t really sure about what direction I wanted my life to go in. The only thing I did know was I was in love with a great guy. Conway Pauls entered my life a few months before graduation. He was a University student and was a drummer in a band. Dad was a little apprehensive at the first site of him but after getting to know him, loved him as I did. My parents were very supportive of our relationship. We became very close and when he left the area in the summer, I followed him to Toronto. I returned in the fall only to find no work locally or even as far as Brandon. Conway had moved on to Thunder Bay and since I couldn’t find work in Manitoba, I decided to leave home and look in Thunder Bay with him. To my surprise when he came home to get me, he presented me with an engagement ring, which I happily accepted and my parents were thrilled. I landed a full time job at Zellers Department Store. I pondered what I wanted to do with my life while working. Conway convinced me to apply to Herzing College in Winnipeg to become a Medical Transcription/Secretary. I was accepted and we moved to Winnipeg in 1979 so I could attend school not to mention being closer to mom and dad – I was pretty homesick. It was a very tough condensed academic course, but I completed it just before my father’s death November 10th, 1979. Once again the family was devastated. At my mother’s pleading, I attended my graduation ceremony two weeks later.

In December, 1979, I acquired a full time position as a stenographer at the Manitoba Clinic. In October, 1980 I quit my job and moved across the street to the Manitoba Cancer Foundation into an Interview clerk/receptionist position. After a few months in this position I moved into a job I loved, stenography. I always found it to be challenging and interesting to write people’s histories and problems. It is almost like reading and writing a biography everyday.

After living together for 4 years, Conway and I decided we should get married and so we did September 5th, 1981. We had a good life together and we were blessed with our first child, a son, Conway Raymond Pauls Jr, born March 12th, 1982. Soon after, a second child, a daughter, Ashley Elizabeth was born December 13th, 1983. We had the perfect family and decided not to try to improve on perfection! I worked at the Cancer Foundation until 1985.

We decided we didn’t want to raise our children in the big city and decided to move home to Napinka. Mom was very happy to have us home and she doted on her small grandchildren. We completely renovated Mom’s home and we were all very very close, playing cards at night and going to bingo. I cherish those memories now, we had so much fun. It was nice for me that I could afford to stay at home with the children and be close to my mom. By 1988 mom had gone her own way but we still tried to remain close. By this time Conway Jr. was off to school and Ashley was chomping at the bit to go to school the next year although she was only four (I wasn’t as good a playmate as her brother), so I took a part-time job, two days a week at a chiropractor’s office just for something to do. I quite enjoyed running the little office but it started me thinking about staying in a small town with no opportunities again.

Conway and I had discussed moving away several times and so we decided to move to B.C.   Our dreams were realized in July 1991 when we packed up and moved to Campbell River, B.C. We bought a little trailer and made it our home for 3 years while we worked and saved to build a home which Conway designed and built in 1994. At first I worked at a private clinic for 6 months and then became employed by the hospital in Health Records Department as a stenographer which I loved. I have worked in all facets of the hospital to date, x-ray, the lab, health records etc.

Since moving to B.C. our family has prospered and we have been able to do extensive traveling with our children to Mexico, Washington/Oregon coast, California, Florida and the Caribbean. Even when they were teens, they still wanted to go on holidays with mom and dad and we have given them really great memories of fun and laughter. We really are thankful to have been able to do this for them and ourselves and hopefully can continue this tradition with them after they have flown the nest. At the time of this writing Conway Jr. graduated from high school last year and is working at SuperStore and saving his money to go Vancouver Film School, which is his dream. He is a very talented, good natured, gentle person who I am sure could go far in his chosen career. Ashley has just graduated from high school this year and as yet is unsure of what she would like to do. She is an intelligent, creative, original, spirited, and kind person and I am sure her path will be an interesting one, (for all of us!). I am very proud of both of my children and my husband who also returned to University in an effort to get out of the construction trade. He received his teaching degree. He has been tutoring now for two years. Construction is still his first love, besides music which he has re-introduced himself to this last year with his own band. They play for fun and a portion of the profits are donated to the Children’s Wish Foundation. Conway does a lot of charity work and community oriented activities. In my spare time I love to do any kind of craft and sometimes enter the craft fairs when I have a good stock pile building up. Dancing is my second love and I get the opportunity whenever Conway’s band is playing. It is my wish to die on the dance floor. 

G11: Conway Raymond Pauls Jr 1982 & Lacey Thomas

Conway Raymond Pauls was born on March 12, 1982, in Winnipeg, Manitoba, to Lynda Diane Shiels, age 21, and Conway Pauls, age 35.

Conway married Lacey Thomas and they have a daughter Violet, born July 10, 2016 in Campbell River.

G11: Ashley Elizabeth Pauls 1983 & Dereck Newman

Ashley Elizabeth Pauls was born on December 13, 1983, in Winnipeg, Manitoba, to Lynda Diane Shiels, age 23, and Conway Pauls, age 36. She was the second child of Lynda & Conway.

Ashley married Dereck Newman and they have two children. Arya Elizabeth Newman was born on September 26, 2013, in Campbell River, British Columbia. Charlotte was born on April 23, 2016, in Campbell River, British Columbia.