Stories

First Real Job - March 2025

In May of 1999, after going through numerous interviews for my first University coop assignment, I landed an accounting position in a technology consulting company in downtown Ottawa. Seeing as how my three previous positions were paperboy, fence painter, and pizza maker, you might imagine how nervous I was walking to work on my first morning. I was two years into my Bachelor of Commerce degree, and was anxious to see if my accounting skills were up to snuff in the real world where I would be making the godly sum of $10 per hour.

I’d like to tell you that it was an easy transition from making pizzas the previous summer, but I’d be lying. Wearing the mandatory pants, tie and dress coat that first day, my first shock was that I was the youngest person on the floor by at least 10 years. In hindsight, knowing how important it is to have friends at work, the lack of people even close to my age should have been a red flag for what was to come. 

Later that first day, I managed to get yelled at by my supervisor when I made changes to a spreadsheet that the previous coop student had set up with his superior Excel skills. With my tail between my legs, I called my predecessor, who went to my University, and he kindly instructed me how to undo the damage I did to his precious spreadsheet. 

By the end of my first week, I was in survival mode, constantly worried about making mistakes that couldn’t be undone. I also felt like a total imposter that Friday, wearing an alternate tie with my first suit, as I only had three to my name, two of which were purchased the week prior to starting. Feeling defeated, I had given up on any aspirations of being a star employee, or being asked back for a second stint at the firm.

Over the next 3 and a half months, I didn’t magically get any better at the job, but I kept showing up. My pride wouldn’t allow me to give up on the idea that a small town country  hick could indeed hack it in corporate accounting. My supervisor never yelled at me again, probably because I started asking for help more often. Toward the end of my term, I even managed to improve my predecessor’s glorious Excel spreadsheet. 

My less than illustrious redemptive arc was completed on my last day when my supervisor asked if I’d want to come back in four months time. I thanked her, as I didn’t want to burn any bridges, but told her my goal was to do four different coop placements. The insecurity, worry of making big mistakes, and the feeling I simply didn’t belong were enough to make my first job rather unpleasant.

Looking back, what I learned that summer is that being competent at anything takes hard work. Almost 30 years later, I still suffer from insecurity and feeling like an imposter in my current job, albeit less often. As I manage people now, I continually wonder how I can alter the work environment so that people will feel more comfortable, and not feel like awkward outsiders, trying to prove themselves while wearing fancy clothes that don’t fit.

Winter Lover - February 2025

The night before leaving on my last all-inclusive trip, I was shoveling after a huge snowstorm. As I wasfinishing up shoveling, I found myself out of breath on top of a snowbank taller than I am, sweating profusely, and then vomiting up that night’s supper. Instead of telling my wife I was sick, I decided that it was a better idea to stick with the plan, and take our two kids, aged 5 and 2 at the time, to Varadero Cuba the next day.

Leaving in February 2020, I’d like to tell you that vomiting on top of a snowbank was the low point of that trip, but it was more of a sign of things to come. After an invigorating 3-hour delay at the airport, once we landed in Cuba, our children survived the week on bread, cheese pizza and desserts. Our first activity was bringing the kids to the main swimming pool, but both found the water too cold, and decided they would not be swimming that week. Although this was both frustrating and surprising given a successful vacation in Cancun the year before, my wife and I rolled with the punches, and decided the beach would be a better bet. Sadly, after getting some sand between their toes, both kids swore off the beach. The only fun activities they were able to enjoy were waking up their parents every day at sunrise, and kicking around a half-deflated soccer ball we found floating in the ocean. The trip ended as promising as it started when my daughter wet herself in the airport while we waited for our delayed flight after she was too disgusted by the state of cleanliness of the airport washroom.

Five years later, and I’m sad to say there are no more family trips south in the winter. Instead of escaping the cold, I’ve been forced to embrace it as the father of a hockey-obsessed son, and a daughter who would much rather build a snow fort than a sand castle. After the 2020 disaster, we decided we’d replace sunny getaways with renting a cottage on a lake for a long weekend that had skating, tubing and snowshoeing. When I say ‘we decided’, I should clarify that I was the only vote for trying a new tropical vacation destination...secretly hoping that maybe it was just Cuba the kids didn’t like, instead of anywhere warm.

Despite my single dissenting vote, I’ve gradually converted to a winter loving person. I took up cross- country skiing, invested in fleeced-lined pants and mitts, and even find myself contemplating a new pair of skates as mine approach 30 years of age.

This week, after 60 centimeters of snow fell over four days, I once again found myself on top of a snowbank. Maybe due to the cross-country skiing, I wasn’t out of breath, and I managed to keep my meal down. Instead, after shoveling the driveway, I was watching my kids, now 10 and 7, take turns sliding down a snowbank at the end of our driveway head first on their sleds, laughing, and enjoying the day. Even with a lack of sun on my face, my smile was big enough that anyone could see I was loving winter.

Average Skater - January 2025

I was 10, on the ice of a tiny, boarded outdoor rink, just off the trans-Canada highway in Petawawa when I realized I was a horrible skater. Some kids from school and around my neighbourhood were playing pick-up hockey, and I went 30 minutes without once touching the puck. There were kids who I dominated in other sports, including road hockey, that were literally skating circles around me. My dreams of playing in the NHL died that night. The only saving grace occurred when I observed that all the really fast skaters kept very low in their stance, which helped them avoid falling when they changed direction, and evade other larger players. 

At 19, when I moved away to Ottawa for University, with the canal, the world’s longest skating rink in the winter, only a 5-minute walk from my residence room, I hadn’t anticipated becoming a better skater. However, one of my close friends was a former junior hockey player. After noticing that much like when I was running a 5km road race, I was basically running on skates, he introduced the concept of pushing with my right foot, and gliding on my left, into my skating repertoire. With his advice in mind, and five years of occasionally skating on the canal, my confidence on ice grew.

I became confident enough in my abilities on ice to actually have a couple of skating dates in my 20s and early 30s. One of those dates ended up being with my now wife. She grew up skating outside in Joliette on a surface similar to the canal, and I was secretly impressed with how she just kept going, no matter what obstacle she encountered on the ice. She had a very practical, effective outlook to skating, which I chose to incorporate as well.

When my son was around 4 or 5, to give my wife a break, I brought him to see his two older cousins play minor hockey. Given how much he idolized his older cousins, I shouldn’t have been surprised when he started to beg to play hockey. When we let him try a season at age 8, and I saw his huge smile, I knew I had officially become a hockey dad. He’s a much better skater than I am, probably the strongest on his team.

During the Christmas break, he invited his 10-year old friend over, and when my wife found his friend fit into my size 11 skates, she offered to bring him to the local rink so he could learn to skate. His parents were nervous since neither of them knows how to skate, but thankful that their son would get a chance. Since my son’s friend weighs about 120 pounds, my wife couldn’t support him to lead him around the ice. I ended up holding him up, leading him around the ice, and giving him the few practical tips I know that helped me become confident on ice. First thing, he had to keep his center of gravity low so he wouldn’t fall as often. When he stopped falling so often, I had him push with his right foot, and glide on his left. When I let go of his arms, and he tripped over the cracks on the ice, I told him to find a way around the various obstacles he was facing. My son’s friend won’t be playing in the NHL any time soon, but he’s on the road to becoming an average skater….even though his coach isn’t much more than that himself.