Wind Phone Aims to Honor Dad, Comfort the Grieving

What would you say if you could have another conversation with someone you loved who passed away?

When Cortney Leverentz’s father, Lyle, died suddenly at 62, she was traveling in New Zealand and unable to say her last goodbyes.

On the journey home, Cortney saw a post about wind phones. The first wind phone was installed in Japan, an out-of-commission phone booth that offered a grieving man the space to speak to those he missed. After the 2011 tsunami, many more visited the wind phone to say all they wanted to say to those swept away. Their voices were carried to the wind, but it helped their hearts heal.

Cortney now seeks to honor her dad and help others as they grieve with the installation of a wind phone in the gardens of Benefis Peace Hospice.

Donors can contribute to the building and maintenance of the wind phone at Benefis.org/Give. Under gift designation, select other and write in “wind phone.”

“It was like a fate thing,” Cortney said of learning about wind phones. “It will be the perfect addition to Hospice. Everybody got on board, and it’s starting to come to fruition.”

Instead of an upcycled phone booth, Cortney, a Hospice volunteer and an occupational therapist, is working on a custom, enclosed gazebo with enough room for a wheelchair or walker and a support person so everyone can access the space. It’s meant to be durable to continue to bring comfort into the future.

“You go into the wind phone booth with your own grief and feeling alone, but then you’ll feel those who grieve, too, and made this project possible,” Cortney said. “It will be open to the community as a meditative and reflective place for those who need it.”

The phone will be on the south side of the Hospice House next to the new garden area in development honoring former Benefis Vice President Terry Preite and other employees.

The campers at Camp Francis, the Peace Hospice camp for bereaved children, will make tiles for the wind phone this week. Others have helped with design, site consideration, phone selection, and more.

Lyle was an architect, as well as a devoted father to his girls. He would have loved seeing the plans develop, Cortney said.

“I am excited to have this project to show the community and to have it in memory of my father,” she said. “This is the community coming together with their time, their talents, the space and gifts to construct it.”

So far, Montana has one registered wind phone, the Telephone of the Wind at Boettcher Park in Polson.

Cortney hopes the Benefis Peace Hospice wind phone can make its debut this fall.