Kevin Dubois doesn’t recognize his best friend.
Trapped inside John Mann’s body is an unbridled energy. Dubois was drawn towards it. We all were.
You’ll have to excuse me, I’m not at my best
I’ve been gone for a month, I’ve been drunk since I left
These so-called vacations will soon be my death
I’m so sick from the drink, I need home for a rest ... Take me home!
Spirit of the West challenged you to not tap your toes to that up-tempo tune played in watering holes from coast to coast in the 1990s. You lost.
Dubois, a longtime Deep Cove resident, was a fan of Mann before he became famous. Maybe it was because they were both artists but, for whatever reason, the two just clicked.
The Squarerigger Pub, near Ambleside Beach, in the early ’80s was the setting.
Dubois watched as Mann and these young fellows jumped on stage and created this energy that he couldn’t describe.
“They were the real thing,” says Dubois of Spirit of the West’s early days. “As soon as they started to play you were taken in by them.”
In those days Spirit of the West toured from one end of the North Shore to the other and everywhere in between. Dubois was a fixture at their shows.
The iconic frontman’s girlfriend, Jill Daum, just happened to be friends with Dubois’ girlfriend, Erian Baxter, owner of Deep Cove Canoe and Kayak.
Soon the foursome was inseparable, spending many summer days at a special spot up the Arm, where the boys would go skinny dipping. Seal Point is what they called the spot but geographically the cabin was located just before the old powerhouse.
“Yeah,” says Dubois with a laugh and a nostalgic sigh. “I’ve got a lot of stories. There’s ones with clothes on, clothes off.”
The friends were back on the water paddleboarding in Deep Cove recently. But it was different this time.
Dubois’ voice softens.
“It just sort of showed me how quickly his decline was,” says Dubois.
His fit friend, by outward appearances, struggled to control his body on the board. Dubois stepped in to save him at one point.
Mann has early onset Alzheimer’s. Less than 10 per cent of people diagnosed with dementia are under the age of 65. Mann was 51 when he found out he had Alzheimer’s in 2014.
As his neurodegenerative disease progresses Mann is losing his identity, his agility – his ability to move people with his music. Some days he can’t even speak.
But Mann hasn’t lost his spirit.
Dubois did an awareness walk for Alzheimer’s recently with Mann. Suddenly, a Spirit of the West song blasted from the loudspeaker to start the event and Mann perked up.
“And John just flew into full-on dance, gyrating to the music, just absolutely incredible,” says Dubois. “So he still has that in him.”
Before Mann was given his devastating diagnosis, his brain was a sparkling source of life and creativity.
Dubois, a professional painter-printmaker, says he was honoured when asked to capture the essence of his longtime friend in a brain sculpture for a special art installation in Toronto.
The Telus Health Brain Project aims to use art as a vehicle for conversation and start a public conversation about brain health and bring awareness to diseases like Alzheimer’s.
Selected artists took blank brain sculptures and teamed up with famous Canadian personalities including Mann, Kurt Browning, Wayne Gretzky and Peter Mansbridge to put their ‘minds’ on display.
The blank brains were transformed into beautiful, energetic and thought-provoking pieces of art.
“Jill asked John, ‘Who would you like to represent you?’ And John said ‘Kev,’” says Dubois of how he came to be a part of the project that’s close to his heart. “I was absolutely honoured and joyful and elated that John would honour me that way. I would do anything for John.”
The art project also afforded Dubois the opportunity to spend some precious time with Mann.
The two friends sat around his studio in the spring, while Dubois drew Mann.
He burned through many canvases, not wanting to miss a single crease on his face.
If he was to do a caricature of Mann, Dubois says he would highlight his big blue eyes, which can’t hide Mann’s enthusiasm for the world.
“John’s an engaging, interested, compassionate, knowledgeable, genuine and all-around accepting person. So he welcomes you into his world – he’s a very giving person. He creates a very large space around him to encompass a whole world of activity.”
Being Dubois’ biggest fan and amassing the most amount of his art, Mann sat patiently while his friend drew.
Staring at the blank brain sculpture issued to each artist, Dubois knew just what to decorate it with – marbles.
He sees Mann’s captivating blue eyes in the marbles. There’s also a subtle reference in the art to a famous expression about marbles and losing your mind.
The humour and irony inherent in this sculpture embody qualities that Dubois has known and loves in Mann.
“It is a cliché that raises awareness and kind of makes you go, ‘OK, we can’t take ourselves too seriously,” explains Dubois of marbling Mann’s brain.
Asked how many multicoloured marbles it took to capture Mann’s creative mind.
“Good question,” says Dubois.
He takes a minute.
“There’s hundreds.”
This isn’t the first extremely personal art piece Dubois has done.
In paying homage to his late father who passed away from a stroke, Dubois placed his ashes inside a large mortar and pestle made of crystal hand-blown glass.
The conversation piece about death and how we deal with it as a society, or don’t deal with it, as Dubois says, was featured in an art gallery installation.
Calling it “Loss of Found,” Dubois unveiled Mann’s ‘brain’ to him first in the studio. Mann couldn’t hide his emotions after seeing the moving art piece.
“Sometimes the look on John’s face is rather overwhelming because he’s an angel who fell from heaven,” says Dubois. “His reactions are always so genuine and so heartfelt. He’s a very loving human being.”
Mann’s ‘mind’ is among 100 colourful brain sculptures currently scattered around the streets of Toronto as part of the outdoor art exhibit, which aims to raise awareness and funds for Baycrest Health Sciences, an academic health sciences centre affiliated with the University of Toronto with a special focus on brain health and aging.
Mann is one of more than 70,000 people in B.C. living with Alzheimer’s disease or another form of dementia. With a surge of baby boomers entering their golden years, cases of dementia-like diseases are expected to climb dramatically.
It’s estimated that by 2031, 1.4 million Canadians will be living with dementia, nearly double the number today.
Sadly, there is currently no cure for the devastating disease which robs the afflicted of their intelligence, memory and eventually their life.
Ultimately Dubois hopes his art and the overall project dispels any misconception that Alzheimer’s only strikes old people.
“We used to think it came in your 70s or older but now it’s coming to younger people. John has become a poster boy for Alzheimer’s and started that conversation,” says Dubois.
The project also casts a spotlight on Alzheimer’s caregivers such as Mann’s wife, who not only has to come to grips with her beloved husband’s illness but also makes sure he is safe 24 hours a day.
“John’s brain used to be a radiating beauty. Now it strives to overcome unbeatable obstacles every moment of every day,” says Daum, a Vancouver playwright.
Daum co-created and performs in the internationally acclaimed trilogy of plays: Mom’s the Word. She is currently working on a stage play, Forget About Tomorrow, for The Arts Club Theatre about a woman whose husband is diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s.
Dubois says it’s inspiring to see Daum care for Mann and their relationship is a model of what a marriage should be – supporting each other through sickness and health. It has Dubois reflecting on his own relationship with Erian, his assistant in life and on this brain project.
“She was a big help,” says Dubois. “She helps in every way. What doesn’t she help with?”
The two families are close, enjoying birthdays and every Christmas dinner together either in Deep Cove or at the Mann homestead in Vancouver since what feels like forever.
Dubois doesn’t know how many milestones he has last left with Mann, but for now he’s making the most of their time together and holding onto the memories.
“I’ve always considered John to be my best friend – and you don’t get to have that many best friends in life and I feel very, very lucky that I got to be John’s really close friend.” ■
