The last thing he did before he left was to hug and kiss his family, as he always did, she said.
Ponsonby Intermediate School principal Nick Wilson died from a heart attack when he was on a fishing trip in Tinopai a week and a half ago.
On Saturday, May 16, Nick was away on a fishing weekend with his father, Geoff Wilson.
The stormy weather kept the pair from taking the boat out, so they stayed the night at their family holiday home in Tinopai, Northland.
Racheal Wilson, 49, told the Herald her husband died shortly before going to bed.
The couple met when they were young, at a pub. She was a teacher at Pakūranga Heights School and education became one of the many things that bound them together, she said.
Racheal remembers first being drawn to his crop of corkscrew blonde curls. They hit it off immediately and he soon proposed.
Racheal and Nick Wilson, pictured when they first met. She says she was drawn to his corkscrew blonde curls. The pair went on to have a 25-year marriage.
The couple married at Howick Historical Village and, a few years later, welcomed two children, Jack, now 18, and Mia, 16.
“Nick was my world – a fun, loyal and funny husband. He was deeply committed to everyone in his life – an amazing father and brother to James. We were best friends and happy doing things together; we didn’t need a lot of people.
“We loved fishing, boating and renovating houses together. Nick loved hard; he was the calmness to my craziness.”
Mia, Jack and Racheal Wilson, the children and wife of Principal Nick Wilson
Racheal said the children adored their father, who was always present and an “A+ Dad”.
“He was always playing around with them. Sometimes we’d be sitting down having a wine, and Nick would be out playing ‘Heads down thumbs up’. When Jack was little, he’d take him to the beach, and they would spray paint rocks or go treasure hunting.”
Racheal and Nick Wilson with their two children, Jack and Mia Wilson, when they were little. They are now 18 and 16.
The popular principal’s other “world” was Ponsonby Intermediate.
He arrived as a relieving teacher and never left. Thirty years later, the principal’s death has left a huge hole in the school and wider community.
When their daughter Mia turned 1, Racheal started working one day a week in the school’s art room. The one day eventually grew into four at the school’s learning centre.
The pair kept school and home in “separate boxes”, Racheal told the Herald.
“We were very close at home and distant at school. Some people didn’t even know we were married,” she said.
“A teacher once said to me, ‘Oh, you mentioned your husband was a principal – where does he work?’.”
Racheal and Nick Wilson on their wedding day. They compartmentalised their work and private lives in a way that worked for them.
Nick’s younger brother, James Wilson, described him as “an amazing, energetic motivator”.
“He would walk into a room, and you’d feel his energy. He connected with people so easily and was genuinely interested in them. His reach was huge. He still had friends from kindergarten days,” James said.
Racheal said her husband led with his heart. He knew the students by name and would always stop to say hello.
On Thursdays, she said, he would come home from school “pumped” after a full day of “hard-out” sport.
News of Nick’s death was announced in an email to parents from board of trustees chairman Hamish Hopkinson.
“It is with enormous sadness that we have to inform you of the sudden and unexpected passing of our beloved principal Nick Wilson … ” the email said. “A tōtara has fallen in the great forest of Tāne.”
Racheal Wilson said her husband Nick Wilson’s legacy is his family and Ponsonby Intermediate.
Hundreds gathered to farewell him at his funeral on Friday.
Through emotional tributes from family, friends and colleagues, a picture emerged of a man deeply devoted to his family, fiercely passionate about education and able to light up every room he entered.
Racheal says her husband’s legacy is his family and Ponsonby Intermediate. She is also immensely proud of their “brave and gorgeous” children.
One thing he taught her, she says, was to live each day to the full – because that’s what he did.
“We have had an amazing life that’s been cut too short. We had so many plans to travel and go on a cruise. The good die young; it wasn’t meant to be this way.”
Carolyne Meng-Yee is an Auckland-based investigative journalist who won Best Documentary at the Voyager Media Awards. She worked for the Herald on Sunday from 2007-2011 and rejoined the Herald in 2016 after working as an award-winning current affairs producer at TVNZ’s 60 Minutes, 20/20 and Sunday.