Successful People from Our Neighborhood - Mark Dewdney, CPR Instructor
Mark Dewdney is a father to Ella and A.J., husband to Rita, and "Dad" to three street-rescue cats - Siren, Smokey and Sootie. Mark is a Toronto EMS instructor, he teaches first aid & CPR and saves lives in the meantime.
Mark, what do you do for life, what is your position called?
I am a First Aid & CPR Instructor (through Toronto EMS’ Cardiac Safe City Program)
Where are you originally from?
I was born in Toronto and adopted to Cambridge, where I spent my (admittedly crazy) childhood.
Could you share a few words about your family, parents, siblings
I am SO blessed. I met my wife, Rita, when a friend dragged me out to a bar. I don’t really do bars, so I spent the night hanging out with the bouncers. I’d noticed this pretty Portuguese girl a few times, but I didn't say anything.
Well, later, as I was walking a drunk out (always on duty…) Rita came bounding across the dance floor, stopped me and said, “I just wanted to tell you that I think you’re adorable.” Boom, knock me over with a feather.
That was in 2004, and we now have two crazy but beautiful kids - Ella, who is nearly 8 (going on eighty) and A.J., who is nearly six. Both our kids are the spitting image of Rita and I when we were little - I mean, it’s like looking into a picture from the past. Oh, right…don’t forget the three cats, who we rescued right off the streets - Sootie, Siren and Smokey. Sensing a theme here?
My Mom, Frances, was a pharmacologist along with trying to keep myself and my younger sister Bronwen under control, and my Dad, Eric, was both a Director of an art gallery and a really excellent custom-furniture maker.
We learned a lot from my grandparents; my grandfather’s first job was teaching Native Canadians English (he commuted via canoe!) and he and Grandma traveled extensively, helping native cultures and peoples as well as helping found and grow the hamlet of Glen Williams.
The most inspiring part of our family story, though, HAS to be “Mommy” or “Mama”. Arriving in Canada, speaking not a WORD of English, having been separated from her husband for YEARS (married by proxy!), she worked in a pen factory for years, the shop foreman teaching her English. Never asked for a dime from the public purse, always did everything herself, and she STILL keeps up with Ella and A.J., taking them to school every day, picking them up every day…without Mommy, our lives would have been a LOT harder, and it’s humbling to see that she wants no more reward - that taking care of us IS her reward.
What was your dream as a child? Did it come true?
I always wanted to be a Highway Patrolman, just like the two guys on CHiPs - and it nearly did come true. When I arrived in Toronto, I made a lot of friends who were cops, and they encouraged me to go to school to become a cop too.
I didn’t last the whole program, though - seeing what people do to their children, and knowing that I could never handle seeing that every day…I just had to walk away.
Funny, though…since I do some acting (just for fun, usually not major roles), I got to play a Highway Patrolman on an American TV show a few years back, and I played the Chief of the New York Police on Beauty and the Beast last year - so I get to play dress-up and get paid for it!
What was your first job and what was your worst job?
My first job…oh, Lord. I had to cut the grass at the local cemetery in Cambridge. Needless to say, you made sure that you got done before dark!
The WORST job ever had to be either running a rickshaw (pulling tourists around in those little wheeled carts downtown) or working at Wendy’s. I WANT to say that the worst job ever was working as a security guard - the pay and the abuse are just AWFUL - but I learned so much from that job, including how to convince people that I’m just here to help - even during the very worst moments of their lives.
Mark, could you tell a funny story from your life
Oh, boy. Which one? I was a hell-raiser as a child (my Mom still doesn’t want to hear all the stories) and I always had a finely tuned sense of outrage - if I got falsely accused of something, uh-oh, it was going to get loud.
Well, I fought and fought and fought when I was a kid, breaking many pairs of glasses and braces along the way, so I developed a bit of a reputation, and it came back to bite me later.
I was actually separating a fight between two friends in Grade Seven - and I was the one who got suspended!
To make matters worse, the principal decided that this time I had gone too far - and he made it an in-school suspension, which meant that Mom got to sit in the front hall of the school with me for three days.
Needless to say, I spent those three days plotting revenge (for once, I was innocent!).
That weekend, after bribing the janitor (who also hated the principal) with a fifth of Scotch from Dad’s liquor cabinet, my friends and I spent the whole weekend unscrewing every single light bulb in the school and placing them up on the roof.
(Don’t ask me why I thought that was the best idea).
Of course, I was sitting in class come Monday, the perfect little angel…and, until now, they couldn't prove a THING. (I think the statute of limitations has long since run out on that one, so I should be safe!)
Do you like to travel and where would you like to go?
It’s not very politically correct to say so these days, but I LOVE the United States - and not the touristy parts, either. I like NOTHING better than going to Chicago (last year) or Boston (this year), visiting a few firehalls and then bribing a couple of the local cops (usually with good coffee, they’re cheap bribes) to take me around to all the nasty areas. What can I say - I have a funny version of “fun”.
Rita - my very patient wife - actually enjoys these trips too; though she’s a lot more cautious, she grew up with cops here in Toronto, so she already knew what she was getting with me. Don’t ask her about the last Chicago trip, though. It’s a funny story to me, but she’s less than impressed.
When we’re retired, we’re going to explore every nook and cranny of Philadelphia, Washington, Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, everywhere - and we’re going to hit a lot of baseball stadiums along the way.
What do you like to do when you have time, your hobbies?
What’s a hobby? Just kidding - though there isn't much time for it these days, is there?
I’m lucky enough to do something for money that doesn't feel like a job, so I consider “emergency preparedness for civilians” my biggest hobby. Running Disaster Prep and First Aid courses is fun to me (I told you that I have a strange definition of “fun”).
Otherwise, I absolutely LOVE being a baseball umpire - I’m lucky enough to umpire junior baseball (the 18-to-21-year-old kids, which is nearly Major League speed!) and the occasional university tournament.
I've been honored to be part of the Ontario Games more than once, and last year, I drew several Baseball Ontario championship assignments.
Oh, yes - and there’s the acting! I get to play cops, firefighters, medics and more in the movies - I've been in Robocop, Degrassi, Rookie Blue, and a whole host of others, all the way back to my first gig on “Anne Of Green Gables”!
Acting will never pay the bills, so it gets to take a back seat to First Aid, though.
What is the most challenging part of your job?
Not getting frustrated when people don’t want First Aid training, especially business owners or managers, who SHOULD know better - the law requires it!
Since heart-attack victims have a three percent chance of survival unless a civilian starts CPR right away (and since 80% of all fatal cardiac events happen at home) it’s just incomprehensible to me why it isn't the law that everyone has to know CPR, and it’s doubly frustrating that people don’t want to pay so little - or spend as little as four hours’ time - learning how to SAVE A LIFE.
Let me tell you, I've been there for CPR that worked, where the person lived, and where CPR failed - where the person died - and I've arrived, too late, to a heart-attack victim that might have been saved if someone had done something.
It’s HARD to tell someone that their loved one is dead, and it’s really incredibly scream-and-tear-your-hair-out angering when I know, the whole time, that if just ONE person had learned CPR, that victim might still be alive.
What part of your job do you like the most?
If people dying because of lack of training is the worst, then it HAS to be the calls that I get from my students - someone will call me up, usually shaking (sometimes crying or even swearing a lot) and tell me about having used First Aid.
I've saved lives myself, I've been there for babies being delivered - but I think I’m more proud of when someone that I teach uses those skills.
My students really DO make a difference, and they make the BIGGEST POSSIBLE difference they can by saving a life - isn’t that the most amazing thing on Earth? From God’s hands. My word, I’m tearing up just thinking about it.
What is success for you?
Success can be defined so many ways - I mean, I want to have enough money to pay off a house, for the kids to be able to choose any school they want, to buy Rita nice things (first, she wants an Audi A6…)
In the end, I think success is when those around you are happy. I like to explain to my kids, who look at me like I have two heads, that I can’t be happy until Mommy is happy, and that’s the way it is around me.
I just want to FIX everything, to help everyone - not just everyone I can, actually help every single person on Earth - and even though I know that’s impossible, I know that, when I’m sitting in my rocking chair at 80, 90, 100 years old (I can hope), I will know, solidly and perfectly, that I helped every single person that I could - that I got as close as I could to helping every single person on this planet in some way, shape or form.
What do you still want to achieve?
So many things! I want to live to be at least 100 years old so I can see a whole century of the human condition and what we’ve gotten right along the way.
I want to be on City Council - that’s a big one. I also want to land a few really cool movie roles - not major ones, but firefighters, that sort of thing - and I want to learn to skate again so that I can referee hockey.
I also want to coach sports! Helping kids learn confidence through athletics is only part of it - good coaches build character and help kids learn to help themselves get out and stay out of trouble, and I can do that.
The biggest…and I’m loath to say it, because I don’t want bad things to happen…if there is a disaster in Toronto, I need to, I’ve got to help. I hope we never get anything worse than this winter’s ice storm, but one day, it will happen, and on that day, I hope I’m standing right there - right beside a load of the people I've trained - ready to make a difference.
What is home for you?
Home is everywhere. I am as “at home” standing talking to people on Jane Street as I am down at the Liberty Grand ballroom or the 51st floor of the Manulife Center. Where there are people, I am home.
I’m most at home spending quiet time - what little “quiet” you ever get with small children - with my family (we live at Keele and the 401) or at a meal at Mama’s place (anyone who has a Portuguese mother in their family understands what that phrase means!)
In the end, Toronto is home. I love this city, even when it’s a disappointment. More often than that, it’s amazing, and I love it. I’ll go away from it, and I’ll come back to it, but there will always be this fierce and ferocious pride when people ask where I’m from. Darn right, I’m from Toronto!
Thank you, Mark! This was an amazing and fun conversation!
To learn more, contact Mark or book your CPR Training Session, please, visit Mark's Page!
Compliments of Marina Gavrylyuk
Real Estate Agent with Sutton Group Summit Realty
www.MarinaG.ca
Photographs compliments of Mark Dewdney
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