I could never wait until the last day of school. When that bell finally rang, sometime towards the end of June, I was always the first one out the door and down the hallway – never a word of thanks to any of my teachers, which served them right for trying to teach me over the previous 10 months.
Nothing much changed in high school. The end of school was a little more drawn out with exams, but I wasn’t one of those students that hung around afterwards discussing the answers – my life began again once I stepped out those front doors.
University was tough, and only got tougher until the very last day when I defended my thesis to a panel of my professors. I sweated for a couple of weeks until my degree came in the mail, but mainly because I didn’t think I could hack one more year of school.
But despite my deplorable attitude towards organized education, I’ve always prided myself on being something of a lifelong learner.
For example, I’ve always regretted how pathetic I was in math, science and French, and the fact that I cowardly opted out of those courses as soon as I was allowed to by the curriculum. In both math and science, I’m sure I only passed Grade 11 because the teacher knew I wouldn’t be going on to Grade 12 – there’s no end-of-year mark quite as suspicious as a 51 per cent.
Of course that meant I couldn’t go to a university in Ontario, where Grade 13 credits in at least one of those courses was a prerequisite, but I had already found a school in Halifax that would take me on my other grades – which were actually pretty good.
But while I’ll never cut it as an engineer or doctor, I still try my best to remember what I did learn in school, and to expand that knowledge.
If I have some free time, sometimes I’ll try to do some remedial algebra or calculus questions that I find online – I usually do poorly but I enjoy the sensation of using the left side of my brain now and then. It’s like stretching your legs after sitting down for a long, long time.
I read science magazines cover to cover, and what I don’t understand I always look up until I know what’s what. I also enjoy experimenting with computers – not actually writing code, but making an effort to understand how the code looks and how it works. My inability to do science in school hasn’t dimmed my ability to appreciate it.
I don’t get many opportunities to speak French, but now and then, when nobody is around, I’ll put on French television for a few minutes and try to understand what the people are saying. Hockey games are best because I’m familiar with the subject matter, but movies I’ve already seen a few times in English are a gold mine. I don’t understand all the words, but I think I’ve finally got the accent down.
Part of the reason I love Whistler so much is the fact that you’re always learning new things. Whether it’s riding switch on a snowboard or figuring how to get my bike down a rocky slope in one piece, every day I feel like I’m being tested.
Sure, the tuition here is expensive and failing tests can be painful sometimes, but an adrenaline rush is as good a motivator as a teacher’s gold stars could ever be.
Most recently, I’ve been trying to teach myself to skate again. I quit playing hockey when I was in pre-PeeWee for the very simple reason that I totally sucked at it and wasn’t having any fun. I also wasn’t much of a morning person even then, and hated getting up for 6 a.m. practices and games.
I could barely skate, and as goalie it was always my fault when we lost. I also didn’t have the right attitude – I got mad when somebody scored, and took a lot of dumb penalties.
Luckily I discovered skiing around the same time I dropped out of hockey, was hooked, and spent my winters riding the snow-covered bumps around Toronto.
Still, I’ve always wondered what might have happened if my parents had forced me to keep playing hockey with all of my friends. I’m not the world’s worst athlete, despite what I thought when I was 10, and I easily went on to make my high schools’ football and rugby teams. Maybe I’d still be playing hockey today.
Rather than wonder what might have been, lifelong learner that I am, I’ve been strapping on the skates. I’ve been to a few public skate nights and afternoons to test out my legs, and thanks to the awesome skate patrollers at Meadow Park and a few patient friends, I’ve gotten lots of pointers. Last week I went to the LUNA Hockey 101 event and played a bit of pickup hockey.
What I’ve discovered is that I still suck. I can stop on both sides (usually), skate backwards (slowly), and do a few other (very basic) moves. I’m a long way from front and back crossovers, or even making a complete lap of the arena without a bobble and a near-crash.
But I figure that if I continue to drop into public skating through the summer and into the fall, I might be ready to play a little beginner’s drop-in when the winter rolls around.
With the kind of winter we had, I need another sport. And who knows? With a little more hard work and a few games under my belt, I just might be good enough to play Old Timers some day.
A guy can dream.
