Flirting with the Feasible

I am satisfied to share with you that I recently saw Arcade Fire play  at Place des Festivals… sort of. I was one of the cocky smart asses who got there late and spent hours squinting at a projection screen, so I technically saw a cool music video. Still, standing in its radius of awesome has earned me the right to boast that I saw the band perform live. There I learned that lead singer Win Butler attended McGill, where he met his wife, also a band member. Hearing this kindled a sense of pride in me, but also a pathetic hope that one day I will have my turn to be great. Certainly, it won’t be in the music field. I’ve only ever taken five guitar lessons shortly after which my instructor bluntly blurted that I lacked any indication of talent – a deep blow.  I’d most likely attain fame and distinction for writing an academic paper or conducting some form of research.  Note that I use the term fame loosely. While I may feel giddy at the thought of a roomful of academics and three high-school outcasts quibbling over my paper, it’s probably not the definition David Bowie had in mind…

McGill’s success stories neither begin nor end with Win Butler. Distinguished academic and artistic elite like Leonard Cohen, William Shatner, Sam Roberts, Jack Layton, and even Wilfried Laurier probably bitched about hiking up Doctor Penfield. While I sit through another unbearable lecture, I wonder, Did Stephen Leacock also freeze his ass in this uncomfortable seat a few decades ago? Is there a future Nobel Prize winner in my political theory class? It better not be the little fucker sitting in front of me shamelessly stalking some chick on Facebook. It’s both exciting and unrealistic to think that any of us could become the next world leaders and make a name for ourselves.

We were specifically chosen out of the thousands of applicants to attend this refined university and mingle amongst a circle of prodigies. We have shown signs of potential. I ask myself, did Cohen contribute to the lyrics of our beloved chant, McGill once, McGill twice, holy fucking Jesus Christ? It goes like this, the fourth the fifth, Hallelujah – it must have been a hidden verse. Did Win Butler polish his vocal chords screaming this worthy tune on lower field? If we could better identify with these characters, it would make greatness a tad bit more achievable.

Yet before I proclaim myself the future Prime Minister of Canada, I ought to keep in mind the thousands of unfortunates that graduate each year with Liberal Arts degrees and go on to develop successful careers in retail. With so many potential Nobel  prize winners around, it’s becoming really hard to pick out the genuine geniuses from the Starbucks employees. I sometimes wish the future billionaires were more evident so I’d know who to befriend. There ought to be some sort of clues to highlight these aces, but since there is little chance of anyone ever conducting any sort of study on this, I modestly take it upon myself to exchange numbers with at least one future tycoon.

While the chances of going to elementary or high school with someone who will become rich and famous are incredibly slim (allow me to share that two members of the classic rock band Rush and one of the main actors in Degrassi attended mine), they significantly increase with higher education. It seems the young populace is placed under a filter of competition, so only those with genetic superiority and ambition make it through. And of the filtered few, only a handful ever escapes the secretary curse that jinxes so many undergraduate school graduates.

I, however, am not in any way discouraged. I eagerly await my turn to become another statistic, another law school reject, or if circumstances favor me, a modest lawyer of whichever type my whims will dictate. But who knows? I could still be the future editor of The Economist and you should consider lending me a pen in conference next time.