Noela Withington

Noela Withington, who died age 77, was a compassionate nurse, mum, wife and friend, who loved generously and was always brimming with fun and laughter. Noela was farewelled at a funeral service hosted by Kings Funerals and attended by more than 40 family and friends.

Her husband David Withington paid tribute to his wife and their "magnificent partnership that lasted a lifetime."

With the family's permission we share his moving eulogy.

Noela Patricia Smith was born in Cambrai, a private hospital in Pakington St, on March 2, 1944.

Noela grew up in Geelong and trained at the Geelong Hospital as a registered nurse.

And at the age of 77 years and 10 months, she died in University Hospital Geelong on January 13, 2022.

While she lived and worked in Melbourne for much of her life, she was always a Geelong girl at heart.

The second child of Ed and Pat Smith, Noela enjoyed a largely happy and comfortable childhood.

Ed and his brothers owned and operated a fellmongery on the Barwon River. They processed and traded in sheepskins.

One of Noela's earliest memories was the day her father arrived home from serving in the Second World War - the toddler was totally besotted by this handsome man in uniform who had just walked through the door into her life.

She also spoke of early memories of her older brother Barry being wheeled around the streets on what she recalled as a sort of "bed on wheels" after he caught polio. Thankfully he recovered.

But mostly, Noela's memories of her childhood were happy ones: roaming around the garden and the streets of Newtown with her two brothers and their friends; long carefree days on the beach at Torquay, where the family had a holiday house; their pet cockatoo's efforts to demolish their house by pecking away at the wooden veranda; coming home from school each day for lunch prepared by mum; Sundays at Christ Church, where her parents were well known parishioners; long country drives in the family Rover.

There was the occasional mishap of course: such as landing on her head after flying over the handlebars of her bike, or catching her hand in a car door as the car drove away, dragging her after it.

But life for Noela, Barry, Pete and Carolyn, the baby sister who came along a few years after the others, was mostly happy and full of fun.

"Noelie", as her family called her, was educated from kindergarten at The Hermitage, a private Anglican school in Newtown. At school she was diligent about the things she liked, such as music, ballet and even speech training with the pedantic Miss Apted, but her efforts in other areas were not always appreciated by her teachers - she could still recite some of their harsher criticisms seventy years later.

Noela moved seamlessly from matriculation at The Hermitage to nurse training at the Geelong Hospital and graduated as a registered nurse shortly after her 21st birthday in 1965.

She had vivid memories of her time in the nurses home: how she was quickly taught by the older nurses to open an account with the local milk bar and settle on payday; how to obtain packets of cigarettes; and how the ground floor window of her room became the escape route for other nurses to come and go at night. Her closest friends from those days became friends for life.

She loved to tell the story of how the Matron, Marj Taylor, suggested she should spread her wings after graduating and join her friends as they moved to Melbourne. Her mum wouldn't hear of it, so Marj, who knew Pat well, said she would have a word. A few days later Pat tearfully told Noela she was sorry to have been holding her back and presented her with a valuable string of pearls. Noela rarely wore them, but kept them as a treasured memento throughout her life.

Freedom in Melbourne was largely a continuous cycle of work and parties, along with an oft-mentioned road trip to Sydney with younger sister Carolyn to see the controversial musical Hair.

While there were many happy memories, Noela's early adult life would be marked by a series of traumatic events. Two of the worst happened during her time working at Werribee Community Hospital.

First, as a 24-year-old, Noela was left in charge of the hospital when the Matron went home with a migraine on the day of the Lara bushfires in 1969 and a stream of burns victims arrived. Their injuries were horrific. Some made it, others didn't. The trauma of that day deeply affected her and she was unable to talk about it in detail until quite recently. These days they would call her a hero.

Second, Noela suffered a fractured neck and Carolyn was also badly hurt, when Noela's boyfriend was driving her car and overturned it after skidding in gravel on the Melbourne-Geelong Rd near Lara. Because Noela was a passenger in her own car in the days before universal third-party insurance, she received no compensation or support for what would be a lifetime of pain.

She was back at work, still wearing a neck brace, when David came into her life. It was a complicated start.

David was introduced to Noela by one of her then admirers, Bob McVeigh, a work colleague at the Footscray Mail. David immediately knew he had met the woman of his dreams and soon plucked up the courage to ask her out (behind Bob's back, of course). On their first date they climbed the You Yangs, Noela mostly barefoot - it would have been quite a challenge for someone recovering from a broken neck.

They quickly fell in love and it was only a few weeks before David proposed marriage. Actually, it was more like an announcement than a proposal - he didn't even have an engagement ring. So when the Werribee nurses heard about it, they decided to hold an engagement party that night. David drove across the city to the only jeweller he knew at Camberwell Junction and belatedly bought a diamond ring - with cash borrowed from Noela.

David returned to find his fiancée still on duty, wheeling a trolley covered by a white sheet down a corridor in the hospital. After presenting her with the ring, David inquired what was under the sheet. "Oh that's Mr Brown," she said. "I'm taking him to the mortuary."

So began a magnificent partnership that lasted a lifetime. They would have celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary this year.

Noela and David were married at Christ Church Geelong on April 15, 1972, just six months after they met. David's father, the Rev Fraser Withington, officiated jointly with the local vicar, the Rev Herbert ('Herbie') Falwell. Fraser shared a close bond with his daughter-in-law until his death twenty years later.

Noela often recalled her shock when noticing David's date of birth as they signed the marriage register. It suddenly sunk in that he was more than three years younger than she.

After a memorable honeymoon on the road to Adelaide and Sydney to visit friends and family, the newlyweds rented units in Moonee Ponds and Ascot Vale before Noela was appointed Matron of the new Sunshine Private Hospital and they resided in a flat at the hospital.

When Noela fell pregnant, the couple managed to purchase their first home in Camberwell. Sally was born on September 25, 1974 and Chris on November 1, 1975.

Motherhood was Noela's greatest wish and she was a wonderful mum. But the need for two incomes saw her return to work part-time at various hospitals around the eastern suburbs, even as she coped with David's frequent absences due to his flourishing journalism career, along with his love of playing cricket and increasing involvement with the Hawthorn Football Club. Noela - though not a fan of newspapers or politics or sports - was there to support him over the years without complaint.

At the same time they enjoyed a busy family and social life, taking their kids to dinner parties in their bassinets or calling on their favourite babysitter. And there were the annual holidays to various seaside destinations. They had an overwhelmingly happy family life.

Noela was heartbroken by the death of her father at the age of 60 and then her mother's battle with dementia over more than a decade. Another blow came with the premature death of her younger brother Pete.

Through it all, Noela remained focused on enjoying the simple things in life: supporting her husband, her children and her wider family, caring for others at every opportunity, devoted to the patients of the hospital or medical practice or home nursing service she worked for, enjoying a good time and a laugh, and making others laugh (especially by showing off her incredibly deep vocal cords).

She loved flowers and almost always had a fresh bunch in the house.

Her favourite room was the kitchen. She would stand behind the kitchen bench and hold court while visitors gathered around her.

She was in her 40s when she started watercolour painting classes and she remained an enthusiastic "student" for more than 25 years until her arthritic hands failed her. As usual, she greatly underestimated her talent. Dozens of her works are hanging on the walls of family and friends to prove it. For some years she and Carolyn ran weekly art classes at the Geelong Art Society for people with special needs. They had a lasting impact on many lives.

As the family moved to Box Hill North and then, after the children had finished school, to Ocean Grove and Lara, at intervals of around 13 years, Noela's values and outlook on life never changed.

She loved easily and generously.

She was the ultimate pacifist - hence her adoration of John Lennon, apart from the fact she thought he looked like David - and she detested conflict and excessive competitiveness. David found it difficult to draw her into a decent argument, and she was a reluctant player of board games because others tried too hard to win.

She despised pretentiousness and was underwhelmed by celebrity, thinking it a bit of a hoot when accompanying David to official openings or major sporting events with the Premier of Victoria and his wife or attending important civic occasions such as the State Reception for Prince Charles and Princess Diana. 

She was kind, gentle, considerate, compassionate and self-effacing. She had grace and style. And she was always brimming with fun and laughter.

When anti-smoking laws forced smokers to congregate outside, Noela was in her element. Wherever she was, anywhere in the world, she would engage in long conversations with total strangers. Then an hour or two later she would return to David and recount the stories she had heard as if they were long-time friends.

The only personal value that ever changed was her football team. After David informed her that it was a long walk on her own from Melbourne to Kardinia Park, she renounced the Cats and fully embraced the Hawthorn Football Club. She loyally accompanied David to the footy each week until they moved to Ocean Grove, when she declared that she had done her duty and preferred to stay home and watch the games on TV.

What mattered most, always, was her family and friends. She was over the moon when she became a grandparent in her mid-50s, and she could not have been a more loving and supportive "Nanny" to Lucy and Ben. She enjoyed every minute she looked after them as children, and she was so proud of the fine young people they have grown to be.

Noela cared deeply about the things that mattered. At the same time, she tried not to take life too seriously. It was important to keep one's feet on the ground and one's head out of the clouds.

There were more mishaps along the way, including several bad falls, and her health challenges mounted as she got older: from the hip injury that forced her to give up nursing in her early 50s and led to two hip replacements, to a near fatal degenerative ear disease, to ongoing deterioration and increasing pain in her neck and spine, to her treatment for lymphoma (she was so pleased to be able to help others by participating in a clinical trial), and finally to her worsening lungs and advancing dementia.

She rarely complained about any of this. Nothing could stop her from enjoying day-to-day life. Nothing could dim her laughter. Nothing could dampen her love and care for others.

She would light up at the suggestion of simple pleasures like a visit to the pokies or a night out at a concert or musical.

There were many fun-filled local and overseas holidays, trips and cruises with David, with family and with friends. Trips such as her bucket list tour of New Zealand with David for her 60th birthday, the Mediterranean cruise with David and Carolyn, the trips to Southeast Asia and the Philippines to visit Chris, and the regular outings and trips with lifelong friends to spend the earnings of a punters club started in the late 1970s when David worked at the Herald newspaper that is still going strong today.

Life for Noela was relatively straightforward. She never got too hung up on the complexities. She loved generously and received love in return. She cared for others, and they cared about her in return. She laughed often, and she made others laugh.

She was a fabulous daughter, sister, wife, mother, grandmother and friend.

May she rest in peace.

Originally published as Lara's Noela Withington remembered in moving tribute