It all began in the middle of what was my last ditch effort to make something of myself, attending Teacher’s College. Ontario is frigid in January, and I was outside of our “satellite campus” (academic-speak for a decrepit, decommissioned elementary school) having a cigarette and freezing my ass off. The university I was attending had many of these “satellite campuses”, but I have no idea if they were all as bleak as this abandoned hulk, teeming with the unhappy ghosts of children past. Two of the more obnoxious geeks in my class were walking towards the doors from the parking lot and doing their best to glare disapprovingly at my filthy, smoking self while simultaneously ignoring me. I caught a snippet of their conversation as they breezed past, coughing holier-than-thou smug little coughs.
“Well, Queen’s has the biggest job fair in Canada.”
“That’s what I’ve heard. Apparently all of the best schools send their recruiters there.”
“I know. I have a friend who’s in Brazil right now. Lives right on the beach. Huge money…..”
And they were gone, engulfed by the warm, uncirculated air of our shabby little school, still stinking of the damp clothes, cheese sandwiches, and melancholy that are forever the stench of an elementary school, decommissioned or not.
I hated those two sheep with their impeccably finished assignments and correct way of thinking who threw around terms like equity, gender-neutral, and holistic rubrics the way I or anybody else I knew used four letter words. But that freezing day, with the wind howling down from the north, those two walking dead provided me with a rare flash of inspired hope. For better or worse, they unwittingly cracked open the door to my destiny, and for that I will always remember them, even if I don’t find reason to thank them.
