Man of Letters
Hey T,
Uh oh. Is law school the predetermined path of every twentysomething guy with a gleam in his eye? I hope I’m not being predictable. Law degrees clearly have no street cred either. What am I doing? Lawyers don’t rock. Lawyers don’t write. Lawyers grow old and shrill and talk to themselves on the toilet. I should do the opposite of everyone else. Dunno, start a fad diet or something. The Montreal diet. Smokes and smoked meat. And smokes.
Nah, I think school is for me. Law school is looking like Choice #1, because there’s a little thing called Job Prospects afterwards. Otherwise I’m left to go the grad-school route and try to spend my life in the academic cocoon. I’ve long wanted to be a writer of some kind, but I have an unclean feeling about it. Lots of people want to be writers because it’s the sexiest profession in the universe (“Well actually, I’m a writer…”). Nonconformist youths looking in the mirror with an ascot on, and liking the look of it. Envisioning being the erudite “man of letters”, like they say in hagiographies of Truman Capote or George Plimpton. I cannot reconcile the romance of writing with the reality. And yet, those who shouldn’t be allowed near pen and paper somehow manage to fill up the Editorial section of your average big-city newspaper. The career writer churns out filler to pay the rent. I can’t settle my mind on this, and school seems like a good way to pass the time.
I understand McGill is hard to get into, and I don’t think my grades will get me in on their own, because they suck. So, next stop, LSAT city. Not looking forward to that.
Thomas Wolfe is namechecked in Teen Wolf? That’s brilliant. I’m a much bigger fan of Michael J Fox’s later work, such as the Back to the Future movies…and…I guess he didn’t do much movie-wise after those. Great Scott.
OK, I must throw down on Jimmy Fallon. The guy’s a good SNL jokester, for sure, but the man is no actor. I’ve noticed that Fallon has a hard time keeping a straight face during most of his scenes on SNL. You know what I mean? He’s always cracking up at his own jokes, or someone else’s jokes, or at life in all its splendour. His impersonations are hilarious, but if there is justice in this new Century, let him never star in another film again. The movie I watched was Taxi, and it made me want to end my life, with pills. Seriously…terrible.
I’m seeing a production of The Tempest at…I dunno. The theatre name sounds like “Bifteck” or something. Probably a French thing. I’m grateful for the theatre recommendations, by the way, as I haven’t seen much theatre in a long time. Toronto had theatre on every street corner, and I hung out with a few actors/film types from time to time, in part to offset the overwhelming nerd influence in my social life. They would take me to profane home-spun indie shows with nudity and such, and it was good. The crowd would be made to squirm. They would make fun of minorities, for example, but in an acceptable way, a sort of “we’re all in this together so let’s celebrate our idiosyncracies” Canadian-style palaver. An Indian guy calling Chinese people repulsive cheap bastards that make him sick, that sort of thing. It was really funny. The discomfort, the subconscious feeling that we should be more shocked than we actually were, we’re monsters for laughing at this nervy racist blather, that’s funny…
I went to a lot of indie rock shows, and I haven’t been to a damn thing since I’ve hit Montreal because I have no show buddies. Everyone wants to watch Sarah McLaughlin and DJ Such-and-Such. This upsets me. Part of the fun of being young in a big city is that you shouldn’t have to look very hard to find that which appeals to your specific tastes, you know, your sensibilities, but the other side is that it takes even less effort to find things you detest. So I can find twelve people that want to go watch “Taxi” and zero that would want to go see a Ted Leo show. Maybe I’m not trying hard enough. I could start going to shows by myself and dancing on the floor while holding a beer and my jacket. Do I need a friend to come along for me to enjoy live music? Probably, probably. The art scene is sustained on pillars of schmooze, we all know this. We like galleries more than art. We like saying rococo to each other. It’s all true.
Anyway, I must off to bed, as my stomach is hurting from the poutine gratinée I had last night at Fameux, and I’ve got a rough week of work ahead. Two weeks to California. Keep on Ramblin’.
Nick
Posted to:
(2 comments)
Looks like you got the feeds fixed cause now I can subscribe. Which is good, I had a steadily growing irritation at having to use screen real estate to keep you in my bookmark toolbar folder. It’s okay, all is forgiven now. I see you mae the comment link more clickable. Doubleplusgood.
Daniel, my man, I did it all for you. I’m not sure how I fixed the feeds, but there they are. You were right about the comment links all along. I thought I was being designer-chic but I forgot the usability, tsk tsk. Let me know if you see anything else that irks your eye.