Degree of Justice

We are not exactly sure of the timing of this next piece, but George thinks Dad left tiling and went to work in a restaurant as a short order cook.

He remembers teasing Dad saying they weren’t going to eat anything that he cooked. Both my sister and I do recall him talking about being a short order cook, but we aren’t sure of the details.

Again, being a cook wasn’t his forte—after all, he really didn’t know how to cook and had no experience—so it didn’t last long and he soon took a job with Mr. Takanaka in his gardening business. Eventually, this became Dad’s business in the early 1950s and his company F.S. Onizuka Landscaping went on until the mid-1990s.

In 1947, after maintaining his long-distance romance with Kim and after her family had come east to Toronto, they wed on May 23, 1947. They first lived with Dad’s parents who had come east as well and had bought a house, which they turned into a rooming house, on Sussex Avenue. Eventually, Mom and Dad saved enough for a down payment on a house and moved into 6 Durant Avenue in East York. My older sister, Diane was born in 1950, while my parents were still living with his parents and I was born in 1952, the year they bought their first home.

In later years I asked Dad if he ever regretted not finishing university and becoming an accountant, especially as he was so insistent that my sister and I went to university. He said that, although he knew the importance of school and having a good career (and wanted to make sure that his daughters had good careers), he really loved to garden and felt he had found his true calling.

He never regretted not being able to return to university, something he felt was very difficult for him to do considering his circumstances—but only because he found a career he really enjoyed. He loved the outdoors, the opportunity to work with his hands, the ability to create something beautiful that brought pleasure to people, and the sense of pride in owning his own business. He was a wonderful landscaper well-regarded by many of his clients, who trusted him to look after their houses. And now there are many houses in Toronto’s Forest Hill, Kingsway, Bayview, Rosedale, High Park and other areas, that have reaped the benefit of his creativity and expertise.

Dad’s formal education may have come to an abrupt ending, but it did not diminish his ability to continue to learn. He took all of his life lessons and shared them with my sister and me and eventually with his four grandchildren who absolutely adored their grandpa. They are his legacy—his spirit shows up in the way they step up as leaders, in their love of music, basketball, nature, and most importantly the way they view the importance of family and friends and finding a way to make the world just a bit more beautiful. 1 115