Batteries not needed
January 3, 2006
By Cam Tait
"C'mon. We can find a water fountain. It's down this way," I said, as we joined hands and started down the long hallway; the same hallway with the same tiles it had 27 years ago. "Let's go find it." And then, just three days before Christmas, I was absolutely spoiled rotten: I was given one of the best Christmas gifts ever.
We turned the corner and the memories started coming at me from every direction. Thoughts of what it felt like to be young, in my late teens, when I had a full head of hair, a blue denim disco suit, and a colorful shirt - that I wouldn't be caught dead in now - for those Friday night parties on campus. There were recollections, too, of just how special my technology program - Radio and Television Arts - was. We could actually be creative every day we went to school...and we got away with it. (Okay, I confess: my real ambition was to be a radio producer. When that signal faded away I turned to print media and didn't attend one day of journalism school in my life. Just don't tell Nicole, Maggie or Doug at CharityVillage.)
We walked by the cafeteria, where a cheeseburger was...well, just that: a cheeseburger. Nothing else. But a cheeseburger, fries and a pop came to well under a paper dollar bill. It was the same cafeteria where a 15-minute coffee break often turned into two or three hours of talking with classmates. We weren't skipping classes though; we took turns going back to the campus radio station to put on 10-minute songs - longer, if we could find them - and then rushing back to the cafeteria to get caught up in the conversation. We talked about the business and our expectations of, one day, hitting the big time. Maybe a superhour television gig like Lance Brown got at CFTO in Toronto. Or, a great behind-the-scenes job, like Clare Verret landed when she became an assistant producer for SCTV and was doing the lunch thing regularly with people like the late John Candy, Dan Aykroyd and Joe Flaherty. Or, simply finding a job we loved and staying there forever, like Ken Sellar, who still works 18-hour days at Shaw Cable as cameraman/audio man/cable dragger/cook/lighting guru and anything else that needs to be done.
As we turned another corner and made our way past an old radio studio - now a plush office - something profound dawned on me. With our youth and enthusiasm to find work and become good at it, we never really thought about the most important thing we would ever have: a family. Sure, we had ideas of dating the best-looking person in the class. But marriage? No way, man. Kids? Get serious.
I was invited to a function at the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology just before Christmas. It was a wonderful walk down memory lane. But everything was put in perspective as I went down those same hallways I went down as a young man, this time hand-in-hand with someone who, in just three years, has taught me more about life and what it really means to be successful. What a gift it was to be able to walk those hallways with my three-year-old grandson.
Cam Tait is a sports reporter and columnist for the Edmonton Journal. He covered community investments and volunteers for 19 years. E-mail Cam at cam@charityvillage.com with thoughts, suggestions or ideas.
Opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of CharityVillage.com®.
