To Those Who Aren't Around Anymore...

Wow, has it been two years since I last blogged?  So much and so little has happened - life appears to be like that in many ways.  The ephemeral excitement of a brief and wondrous event fades like the prospects of an upstart politician suddenly exposed as a philanderer or fraud.  Anyway, despite the morbid title, this is not a tribute to people who are no longer alive.  When I was on Facebook, I had an annoying habit of mourning the famous and dead a little too selfishly - it was not that I had really thought about them recently, it was more a case of being upset that they weren't around any more, even if that meant they were sick, miserable, or generally settling nicely into old age without being concerned about whether a legion of fans was concerned about their lack of output as writers, actors, musicians, etc...

Naw, this is more of an ode to co-workers who have helped to define my last 22 years at McGill University.  For starters, I miss the old porter in the Arts Building - the canny and eternally suspicious Pietro, catching lazy cleaners by putting invisible tape on the stairs and always fretting about the position of the red carpet, that could or could not be welcoming depending on the student and his/her problem.  I also miss Maggie, the carping, saucy file clerk, proud of her tattooed sons, "teeth in a glass" and sexual appetite.  She fit the mould of the proverbial "old days", when seemingly we worked with fewer rules, fewer worries, and less control by the feckless administration.  I also wonder what happened to our local Sandinista, Charlotte Egner- whose voyage from San Francisco hippie to revolutionary leader to office clerk was both fascinating and humbling.  Ahh, the passage of time can be a toxic catalyst of personal regret.  No need to fret about what "could have happened".  Better to relish the future and maybe a more frequent post now and then.  I saw this over the weekend.  The beauty of Art is in the manner of telling a story with one piece that numerous treaties, treatises, tricks and treats and humanities classes can spend decades trying to describe.  What a great way to spend part of a great weekend in Montreal.