Die, Leafs, DIE!

Seriously?

As if…

Father Time

I received an email from an old school friend who I had not seen in years inviting me to my high school 20 year reunion in Edinburgh last night.

We exchanged a few emails back and forth reminiscing about the days and laughing about some of the nostalgic moments – even sharing a couple of photos from back then.

I doubt I’ll be able to make it but it was fun to hear some of those old names I hadn’t heard or thought about in close to two decades.

Then it struck me.

20 years.

That’s over half of my entire lifetime… I grew up and finished high school, and then lived that lifetime again…

Yet the 2nd half is a blur of acceleration and real life stuff. Some real highlights and some some real lows, but a blur nonetheless.

Flash back to high school and all my memories are in slow motion in comparison. The days seemed endless and the people eternal.

Of all the reunions that I could be invited to, I think this would be the most fascinating – I sometimes feel as sure as that 18 year old who left school, and sometimes as vulnerable as the 12 year old who started it, and wherever we are in our lives, this group of people who will be meeting again in June 2008 will probably relate to that and put us in the same picture.

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Going back to the age thing, I was in one of my university lectures this past week and we’re in the process of forming groups of 6 for a group project… it’s important to note that, for this class, the continuing ed. students have been intermingles with regular day undergrads so there is quite a mix in the room of 80.

I found myself on Monday surrounded by undergrads as we are all reminded that we should start forming working groups. The group who were sat directli in front of me had found 5 members and were looking for a 6th, when they turned to me and made eye contact… I think she knew that I had overheard as she asked me if I was interested. I immediately said “sure”, but as the words came out, the girl who was sat behind me immediately stepped forward and offered herself to the group. Of course I was easily ousted and the 6th spot was gone.

It’s amazing how suddenly and immediately I felt rejected. About 2 moments later, one of the huddle turned around and said, with a small amount of guilt, “Hey, why don’t you become like a reserve – you never know”.

I smiled politely and said that I’d look around and not to worry.

It was then that I realized, maybe for the first time in years that I am not everyman to everything, that I can be rejected for simply being different – in my case, older. It was a strange realization and one which I think many go through – by nature, we tend to surround ourselves with like-minded people, as we grow up, we tend to surround ourselves with people of the same age simply because of consistencies and similarities in life experience, attitude etc…

Of course there are exceptions, but as a general rule…

I still think that I can relate to the younger folks, I lived their life already, right?

The hard thing to accept is that there’s a point by which you are not immediately accepted because you are too far outside of their range or sphere of reference. I’m sure I was the same. Like I said earlier, I know I thought I had it all figured out in my late teens and early twenties and then my education began again.

I wonder if humility goes in cycles…

Ages 0-17, relative humility
Ages 17-25 zero/low humility
Ages 25-40 relative humility
Ages 40-65 zero/low humility
Ages 65- relative humility.

For the record, I wasn’t feeling sorry for myself… not at all.

Just realising that I was somewhere I knew existed, but had realised I’d reached.

Reading back over this, I’m not sure I’ve been all that articulate.

Are there other likeminded 30 somethings who have experienced the same thing?

Love like Twins

Oh my…

As an adopted twin, this story made me sit up and read…

Although I can’t imagine what the pillow talk was like when they found out, I imagine I would need some kind of therapy.

I wonder if they had (after a HUGE amount of processing) epiphanies that made them say out loud:

“Suddenly it ALL makes sense!”“The birthdays, the similar adoption story, the finishing of each others sentences…”

How did they find out?

Who took the first step to say… “y’know, I think we need to do some genetic testing…”

How could all of this come to pass AFTER a marriage?

What happens now for these two?

Mixamytosis

At risk of turning this into a “what a wuh-wuh-whacky workplace I work in” blog, I learned today that one colleague can corner poor subjects and talk at them for a full 35 minutes on the subject of burritos.

Furthermore, the poor unsuspecting fool has been roped into an exploratory visit to Montreals finest burrito place in the plateau to extend this discussion.

He looks like a rabbit caught in the headlights with no where to run.

In the UK, farmers believe that the only humane way to deal with these mixamytosis-afflicted beasties is to take a shovel to their skull and end their misery.

Run, rabbit, run!

No surprise/big surprise

I actually wrote this about 6 weeks ago and it inexplicably disappeared… until now… ah well… it’s content. 

…so I was just playing my guitar to Jack and we were both singing away to some heartbroken Del Amitri…

1. Outside it’s snowing like crazy as was forecasted – although I’m not sure we’ll get the 30cms they predicted (No surprise)
2. From nowhere came a solitary, but enormous flash of lightning followed almost instantly by an almighty crack of thunder (Big surprise)

I looked at the window and then back at Jack who had just done exactly the same thing and we looked at each other for a couple of seconds with what I was sure was EXACTLY the same expression…  bewilderment with a little wide eyed fear.
Then at the same moment we both looked back out the window and back at each other meeting with the same dumbass expression.

Had anyone else seen this – it would have been perfect comedy timing.

I guess you had to be there…

Still… I have never experience a solitary winter flash before – mid snowstorm.

It was quite bizarre.

I Spy…

There’s a guy who sit’s directly across from me at work…

He never sees me because his back is always turned, thus allowing me to watch almost everything he does on his computer, most of which is completely non-work related.

Today he has been surfing through an Iranian personals website for the past three hours.

  

Adios 2007

2007 was, of course, just a great year for me…

In the short 6 months that he has been on this planet (out of utero) I have watched him develop from a pink wriggly wee thing into a communicative, relaxed, happy, healthy and gorgeous wee man. I am so absolutely in love with him, more than I thought was ever possible, and have come to realise that all those clichés are true about the depth to which you adore your own.

I have had the priviledge to witness my beautiful wife grow into the perfect, relaxed and caring mother, and it’s really humbling to see her become this so effortlessly and naturally. I’m sure that she’d deny the ‘effortlessly’ part, but still…

I’m so batty about my family it’s stupid!

I have enjoyed (and can, on reflection, actually say ‘enjoyed’ and mean it!) 9 months of gainful employment and have met some great people with whom I’ve shared some laughs and some great lessons on the journey so far…

I turned 37 years old and have more salt than pepper, but am gradually coming to appreciate the ‘distinguished’ description.

Who am I kidding? I still hate it.

On the flip side too many people I know have been affected by serious illness, and for the first time, I have felt very powerless to do anything truly positive to help.

His journey has been awful and inspiring all at the same time. I know you’ll read this and I state right here that you are – whether you believe now, tomorrow or whenever – the bravest, strongest person I know and I’m incredibly proud of you and what you have achieved despite so much going against you.

There, I said it.

I wish I could have done more.

So for all of the above, there have been resolutions for this new year that are easy to to adhere to, and which I fully, fully intend to keep. They’ll be between myself and the moon, but I guess those who know me will know and understand them through the upcoming days, weeks and months.

By ex-roommate always used to ask the following question at New Year:

What was the best thing about 2007What was the worst thing about 2007

What is your motto for 2008

I think the first two are covered… but the motto?

“Can and Will”

Happy 2008!

What’s yours?

A Rock Star is reborn…

…yeah, yeah, yeah…

We did a good thing…

We raised a wad of cash for Saku’s Foundation… (over $2K)

 But MOST importantly… the inner rock god came out that night…

Thoughts on personal fulfillment

This Saturday is the Saku Koivu Foundation fundraiser, organized by yours truly.

It’s the third annual fundraiser that I’ve put together, but this year seems to have been harder work than usual…

It’s hard to say why – I imagine a combination of timing (I just got back from Washington DC), balancing family dynamics, and just a spread of energy.

It’s also, in some ways, the largest of the events that I’ve produced solo: – 9 acts, marketing, logistics and, the most challenging of all, people!

I was asked the question, whilst in the US recently, as to what I thought was the way to go with life – the dream job which challenges you every day, or a lesser daily challenge, supplemented with created challenges and passions.

My initial reaction was that the dream job is all fine and good, but that, by definition, you encompass all of the things above into that sphere because, if you are anything like me, you throw yourself head first into it and allow it to consume you.

I also firmly believe that you are personally responsible for your own passions, which means that nothing but that motivates you to succeed in them…

I have so much respect for doctors, nurses and teachers who work in extremely challenging circumstances and environments and often wonder if the reason that drove to where they are now still remains. I studied to be a teacher and soon became jaded to the fact that I wasn’t going to change the world and rose tints on my glasses soon faded to let the harsher neon striplights in.

Are they living their passion? And if they devote whatever is left of their lives to something else, is their focus gone?

I now work in an environment which is sometimes dull, frequently frustrating, but often challenging and even rewarding. It also allows me to switch it off at 5:00pm so that I can shift my priorites to family and those things that I can enjoy in their purest forms. I can mix them up when I want and try something else, all the while (relatively) secure in the fact that I can look after the practical things like paying for my heat and car insurance.

And after a couple of relatively high stress but high profile positions before, this is very refreshing… but it’s all evolution… marriage and family brings compromise where there was none and I chose (some) security with changeable opportunity over personal and selfish dedication. I hate using the word ’selfish’, but in my head it is the only appropriate word.

So, having said that I found the fundraising efforts hard, I wouldn’t change any of it, because when it’s all done, I look at it as another thing I created and did because I wanted to, not because I had to…

Now then… whether all of this makes for an interesting life, well that’s another question…

Strapping the Les Paul and jumping about like I’m still 18 years old?

I’ll say…

Dreams of trumpets?

Damn, it’s been a while…

I had a dream last night that I had to sit a high level,. grade 8 trumpet proficiency exam, in front of some very stern french speaking Québecois and within some oak trimmed, old, school setting.

What made the situation all so uncomfortable was that I hadn’t picked up a trumpet in 15 years and that the taking of the test seem to be expected by those who surrounded me… and even though I had no idea who ‘they’ were, I knew there was an enormous expectancy for me to pass and do quite well.

I sat and passed my Grade 8 BSM exam in 1986, playing through the entirety of Haydn’s trumpet concerto, two highly complicated studies, a sight-reading piece and multiple scales, and know, in the cold sober light of day that the preparation for this lies in terms of months, not days, less hours!

In my dream I looked first at the scale list and focused on the scale G# major, and in a moment of semi consciousness I started figure out the progression:

G#, A#, C, C#, D#, F, G, G#, and I caught myself working out the notation with my fingers:

G# = 2nd and 3rd valves, A# = 1st valve etc…

Luckily the set piece was Haydn’s concerto so I felt this wave of relief as I remembered the majority of it, only for a further wave of terror to hit as I remembered the improvised cadenza.

This wave crescendo’d as I looked at some faceless study which required lightening quick reflexes.

And the weight of expectation was almost unbearable as I realised that I was facing something that I couldn’t do. At least not now. Not without preparation. At one time I could have, but not now.

I picked up that trumpet with trembling hands and tried to blow, but all I got was multi-tonal farting: somewhere between noise and sound.

After a few more attempts, the single notes began to appear, and the arpeggios started to flow… but the lip was weak.

As the sense of desperation began to peak, a further sense of hopelessness began to creep into my psyche. Which, especially in dreamland, is not a good place to be. I realised that I was going to have to tell someone I cared about (why else would the weight of expectation be so high) that I had failed and that I couldn’t do what someone so desperately wanted me to do.

It was actually a relief to wake up, and to hear Jack gurgle in the monitor and to see the snow through my window… but I do subscribe to the notion that our thoughts, fears, joys and the such do manifest themselves in weird ways… thing is, I can’t think of anything that is beyond my scope of ability at the moment. I’m someone who will meet a challenge head on for the most part.

Have your way dream analysts.

But it was intense. And I still don’t fully know if I was more nervous that I would take this test and make a complete ass of it, or if I felt so awful that I was about to let someone down, or that I couldn’t do something do something as competently as I once could…

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I checked out my blog stats and although I haven’t written a word in almost 3 months, there is still a steady stream of visitors.

Hello! Who are you?

Do stop to say hi…