Charles "Charlie" William Spidle

December 12, 1939 – June 12, 2024

When Charles ("Charlie") William Spidle left this world on June 12, 2024 in Washington, DC, he was surrounded by his beloved wife, Jonmarie ("Jonni"), and daughters Helki and Jasmeen. Fundamentally decent and kind, warm, and irreverent, Charlie was the best of men, and we will miss him more than anything. He is survived by Jonni; Helki; Jasmeen; his brother Lawrence ("Larry"); sons-in-law Jesse Winograd and Brian Griffith; grandchildren Naomi Winograd, Dalia Winograd, Jack Griffith, and Charlotte Griffith; and many nieces and nephews and dear friends.

He was born December 12, 1939, in Roxbury, Massachusetts to Anna Lillian Veronica (Curran) Spidle and Charles Reginald Spidle. By then, his parents were raising their oldest children John ("Jack") and Lois, but because Charlie was born ten years after Lois – in a quintessential flair of false grandiosity – he liked to call himself the "miracle child." Charlie was soon followed by Marie, Larry, and Robert ("Bobby"). Jokes about miracles aside, what is certain is that he grew up basking in the warmth of Anna's fierce and unconditional love. It does something to a person to be certain of their parents' devotion and admiration, and we believe that confidence bestowed on him a life-long generosity of spirit and quiet assurance that eschewed pretentiousness of any kind.

Charlie, his siblings, and his friends grew up in a riotous children-filled neighborhood on Shirley Street in Lexington. Escapades abounded, including the time a tween Charlie and friends "borrowed" his stern father's car and entirely predictably crashed it the same night. Charlie was thrilled to be briefly hospitalized because he thought it might take some of the sting out of his father's ire. Once, irritated by some childhood injustice, he announced to Anna that he would be running away that day. Anna offered to help him pack his suitcase… and welcomed him back that evening when he determined dinner and listening to the Lone Ranger on the radio was worth ending his escape. With a father who was a Lexington Deputy Fire Chief and an aunt who was a Lexington High School teacher, Charlie always seemed to be spotted when he was up to hijinks. Charlie attended Lexington High School, like his relatives before him, playing football for the school team. He loved Lexington, and considered the town's big April 19th (Patriots Day) celebration to be his favorite holiday.

In 1962, he married the love of his life, Jonni. She had spurned his many requests for dates because she thought they had no chemistry, but decided to give him one shot because she was told he was a fun date. Not long afterwards, they secretly eloped in March 1962, and held a wedding ceremony with family and friends on June 16, 1962. (In the meantime, they briefly sat in the parking lot of a divorce lawyer's office before deciding to stick with marriage.) And they did have fun. Jonni and Charlie shared 62 years of adventure, love, friendship, and laughs. When Nova Scotia Tourism "Doers & Dreamers" magazine featured a picture of Jonni and Charlie kayaking in the cove in front of their log cabin at Cape d'Or, it felt entirely fitting. With some couples, one is the "doer" and one is a "dreamer," but the pair seemed to share both qualities equally. Now, all that love did not mean they did not have their disagreements. For instance, while traveling by train around Italy in the 1960s, they squabbled over the correct stop. Charlie's journal from that trip simply noted, "I got off at one stop, and Jonni kept going." No one remembers how they found each other again, in those pre-cell phone days.

He enlisted in the Navy as an electrician (or a "sparky") and served for three years at the Naval Air Station Alameda. He and Jonni reveled in their time in California, including taking advantage of Navy-sponsored travel to Japan. They returned home to Massachusetts, where Charlie joined his friends in such raucous partying that Jonni once threw all his clothing out their bedroom window in a not-so-subtle cue to smarten up or get out. As time went on, they grew their hair long, gave up the church, opened a pottery studio, and fell in love with the music of the era. Later, one of Charlie's favorite t-shirts read, "I may be old, but I got to see all the great bands."

Charlie attended Boston Architectural School in the 1970s where he enjoyed puzzling through design challenges and connecting with his artistic side. Then, after fifteen years of marriage, Jonni and Charlie became parents, ending Charlie's architectural school ambitions. He listed his career on Helki's birth certificate as "bulldozer operator." Upon becoming a father, Charlie immediately showered his daughters with the same unconditional love and joy with which he grew up. When newborn Helki did not want to sleep at night, he thought she might be scared of the dark and he paced the hallways with a flashlight just in case. When toddler Jasmeen refused to walk after she had recently arrived home from Korea, he played toss with a balloon until the game was too fun and she gave up the pretense and ran to get the balloon from him. We sometimes marveled at his capacity to instantly delight in almost everyone he met, that is unless they crossed his family in which case his fury was swift and permanent.

Jonni and Charlie were intrepid travelers, and showed their girls the world, including gallivanting around Greece and the former Yugoslavia with two-year-old Helki. On a Greek ferry, Helki and Charlie met two young American schoolteachers; they awkwardly reunited with the teachers when Helki later ran towards them on a nude beach in Mykonos. In later years, they shared many memorable trips with their grandchildren as well.

Charlie was a sincerely silly father and grandfather. He sported pink and purple nail polish and trendy friendship bracelets with aplomb, told the best stories, and loved to dance with his daughters. As a carpool dad, he delighted the girls' friends and embarrassed his children for nearly a decade by pretending to be King Charles driving a chariot of loyal servants.

Jasmeen and Helki knew they could count on him for anything, at any time. You might say he was over-protective. For instance, he wanted Helki and Jasmeen to each deliver the Boston Globe for the requisite three years to receive a $5,000 scholarship to college. But it turned out he did not want them delivering the paper alone in the dark in the morning, and so he delivered the paper with them, every day for many years, and then carried on solo after they could not be counted on to wake up early before school. Early boyfriends did not stand a chance of avoiding the crushing handshake of a homebuilder, and the sternest expression he could muster, designed (reportedly successfully) to scare the hell out of any potential suitors. Helki and Jasmeen laughed out loud when they heard how "scary" he was. Eventually though, he changed his tune, and began sort-of-secretly praying to St. Jude (the patron saint of lost causes) for grandchildren, no questions asked. He was much more friendly when he met Jesse and Brian.

Charlie worked hard without complaint in a variety of jobs, but mostly as a homebuilder. After retiring, he was able to take his dream job as an aide to children with special needs at Valley Collaborative. He was so proud of that job, and the children filled him with joy.

Listen, he had his flaws. He was pathologically unable to be on time. His personal filing system was an entire room of junk that we will now have to puzzle through. Parking lots drove him into the purest form of road rage. He had the worst taste in movies – his preferences shifted between maudlin and boring. He was a truly terrible (and slow) driver. He could be sly, including when he pretended he did not back his car into Helki's neighbor's fence, or when he tried to smuggle Canadian birch from the Cape d'Or property into the United States to serve as the posts for Helki's wedding chuppah. And while he wouldn't consider this a flaw, he enjoyed a good dirty joke. Charlie was tremendously accident prone. He was run over twice by cars as a child, once sledding down the street. He took a chainsaw to the thigh, and later cut off his left fingertips with a table saw. (He drove himself to the hospital where they were sewed back on.) And yet, he was perfect.

Later in life, Charlie explored his more creative sides and enjoyed hobbies. He took storytelling classes at his children's elementary school, The Waldorf School, and told the very best stories, including a magical decades-long series "Balloon City" featuring the antics of Sister and Little One, many of their friends, and eventually Ms. N, Ms. D, Mr. J, and Ms. C. He joined The Waldorf School theater scene, acting in the annual Shepherd's Play for many years, and playing the role of Father Christmas at St. Nick's day at school year after year. He also loved vegetable and flower gardening, and took up gourmet cooking in his sixties. A lifelong Boston sports fan, Charlie loved the Celtics best, and would not miss the chance to watch the Pats, Red Sox, or Bruins with Jasmeen. And while they did not always get to watch together, their tradition was to always call each other after each big victory.

About that log cabin. Charlie and Jonni built their dream cabin in a cove on the volatile Bay of Fundy, with the help of local craftsmen. Charlie and Jasmeen handled most of the roofing, and laid down the pine flooring together one summer. When Jonni and Helki arrived, having missed out on some precious cabin time, and Helki exclaimed in delight that it was "all worth it!" because the flooring was so beautiful, Charlie and Jasmeen may have grumbled once or twice. But the cabin had a name that stuck: All Worth It. Which was fitting because summers at the cabin invariably involved Swiss Family Robinson-like projects to make the cabin just a bit more luxurious. Before "glamping" became a trend, the log cabin was both rustic (no electricity or running water) and cozy. Time at the cabin always included great meals cooked on the cast iron stove, good books, plenty of wine, music played on speakers attached to a car radio battery, clusters of candles and oil lamps illuminating the evening's card games, and daytime hikes to the Cape d'Or Lighthouse. Charlie was that rare Canadaphile; he loved nearly everything about Canada including the natural beauty of the landscape; the exceptionally fresh seafood, CBC Radio, especially the program "A is for Aardvark;" the mystery writer Louise Penny's Inspector Gamache series set in Quebec; and the many friends he and Jonni made in Advocate Harbor, Nova Scotia.

Dad, Charlie, we hope you're enjoying a laugh with your best friends; with Jackie and Lois and Marie and Bobby; and with your parents.

We love you as much as humans can love. If the measure of a man is not the worth of your deeds, but the love you leave behind when you are gone, you were a king.

We will celebrate Charlie's life at Douglass Funeral Home in Lexington on Tuesday, June 18 at 11 AM followed by a gathering where we hope you will share your fondest memories of him. Donations may be made to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital or the Home for Little Wanderers.