Hopefully

The World Ain’t Slowin’ Down – Ellis Paul

“Ah, damn it! Hit me,” I said. Michelle proceeded to give me a quick rap on the wrist. I’d said the cursed “H” word again. For the last three or four months, I’d been avoiding using that word. “Hopefully”. It was a favourite of Julius’ and the rest of the Orientation Committee. Whenever we discussed our responsibilities, it was “hopefully this” and “hopefully that”. As if everyone was afraid to set anything in concrete. Not me. They asked me how my planning was going, I would tell them what was happening and what wasn’t. I didn’t want to leave things up to hope. Occassionally I would slip and when I did, I would ask Michelle to slap me on the wrist. I was simply echoing that age old sentiment of “Do or do not, there is no try.” This week, they didn’t need me to try. They needed me to do. So how did that go?

*****

As soon as I donned that black “EXECUTIVE” T-shirt, I felt empowered. I’ve never worn anything that has benefited me socially before; in fact, my particular style, or lack thereof, has often been detrimental in my interactions with other human beings. On this particular day though, I saw something new in the eyes of the leaders and the freshmen. Even though nobody knew me, they looked at me like, “That’s somebody, right there”. It was invigorating. I hate to suggest that such a superficial change would be of any great significance, but this garment of black and gold would serve as the catalyst for the events of the coming week.

*****

The opening events were a near disaster. I remember thinking, “Why didn’t we just order the inflatables and be done with it?” During my own frosh week (and apparently all the others), what they did was set up a bunch of gigantic inflatable playsets for the kids to jump around in and that was meant to entertain us for two hours. I don’t remember anything too bad about it. But Julius insisted that I come up with a new idea, since the inflatables event was often plagued by kids having to wait in line and the overwhelming feeling that we were treating them like…well, kids. My partners David and Michelle suggested an Amazing Race type event, where the kids would go to stations around campus and play games and get to know each other and have a gay old time. Sounded like a fine idea.

Planning it was a friggin’ nightmare! First, we had to find a number of suitable locations. Then we had to make sure to not encroach on enemy college territory. Then we had to figure out two seperate routes so that we could evenly divide the 600 frosh that we were expecting. Then…you get the idea. There were a lot of things to account for and since I’d never planned anything more complicated than my napping schedule up to that point, I was freaking a bit. It all came to a head the Saturday before Orientation Week. We were going to do a mock run-through of the events with the leaders, but the weather was running interference. Even before it started raining, the whole thing was coming off as disastrous. I dreaded Tuesday.

When it came time to run the actual Opening Events, I had no choice but to buckle down and go for it. It didn’t go too badly. We’d spent the last few days ironing out the details and printing out maps and making sure that everyone understood what they were supposed to be doing. There were a few hiccups. This one group got really lost and the leader and I got into a tiff. He was telling me about how his group had already been forced to walk around in circles and that they weren’t going to go any further. I explained to him that the next station was a sit-down game and if they went there they could relax and have fun and get ready for the next physical challenge. I also mentioned that they paid good money to be able to participate in these events and they shouldn’t just give up now because of a small communication/route error. He demanded a vote. I won. Phew.

After everything wrapped up, we held one last event to determine a champion. A watermelon eating contest. The leaders from the top ten groups from each, er, division participated. It got messy. The guy who won was a total maniac and I had to remind him to breathe as he scarfed down that sweet, sweet fruit. After he was finished, he began tossing the slices into the air like juicy confetti.

I awarded the winning team with these oversized, plastic rings that I got four for a dollar from Markville Mall. That went over surprisingly well. I wanted to take one for myself, but…there was this girl. I gave the ring to her and surprisingly, I saw her wearing it again later in the week. I mentioned her before in my Hart House Farm post.

Her name is Elena.

*****

I didn’t get to interact with the actual frosh that much. I was busy running around and doing my thing, so I only had time to get to know my fellow executives and the leaders. Those people were great. I can’t believe all of them go to my college. I’ve been here for four years and I had no idea that there were people like this walking around the whole time. Kind. Funny. Friendly. I’m so used to being ignored and spat on around campus that I actually found their comradery to be off-putting at first. I warmed up to it eventually and I’m glad I did. I can’t keep track of all the great moments there were.

There was Jen, who had chosen to rip her shirt a little to show some more skin. We discussed how she was treading the thin line between “intriguing” and “trampy”. The shirt got more damaged as the week went on and by the end we agreed that she’d walked all the way into “come hither slut” territory.

There was Sean who, despite being at least twice my size, consented to calling me Big Al for the whole week.

There was Patricia, who is kind of a hippy. We got to talking about musicals somehow. She thought they were contrived and I tried to convince her otherwise by coming up with some small song and dance numbers on the spot. Suffice to say, We’re Getting Off The Boat and I Found A Rock On The Street did not sway her opinion.

There was Fathima, who tried to teach me how to ballroom dance. I didn’t know that “dipping” was completely the responsibility of the guy. She almost bumped her head on the ground and I almost pulled a hamstring.

There was Betty, who put up with the stupidity and aggravation that you guys have dealt with all our lives in the span of four days.

There was Andrew, who I butted heads with over the music. He was trying to make the kids listen to some death metal and I was forced to explain to him that his taste in music was shit and that everything I like is good. The usual. Later, him, Julius and I went out for lunch together and talked about chicks. Now there was a subject we could agree on.

There was Isabel, who got real sick Friday morning, which scared the hell out of me. The night before, she sat next to me as I held a mini-concert in the New College Student Council office. The day after, they were calling an ambulance because she was having trouble breathing. Everything turned out fine. Still, I didn’t want her having to exert herself in any way for the rest of the day so she got treated to a world famous Alex Lee Piggyback Ride. I risked throwing my back out carrying her up these stairs, but she’s light and it was worth it.

There was Syed, who followed me around like a puppy dog. I don’t know if he was lonely or he thought I was cooler just because I was older, but he was constantly looking for my attention and approval. He’s a shy kid, but he’s smart and genuine. He’s gonna turn out alright.

There was Stephanie, who I danced with a lot, often with inappropriate closeness.

There was Nishant, who asked me for a list of songs to help him fill up his music collection. Where do I start with that request?

There was Tanya (not The Ice Queen), who assured me that it wasn’t my fault that the opening events were going haywire, even though it obviously was.

That’s just a few of the new friends I’ve made. I could go on all day.

*****

They were chanting my name.

It was about an hour before the boat cruise and I was feeling nauseous. When Julius first came up to me proposing that I be in charge of the Awards Ceremony on the boat cruise, I immediately had the wise idea to attempt to emulate an actual awards show. I wasn’t sure what that entailed exactly, but I knew that I would have to throw a song and dance number in there. It came to my head right away:

Now I ain’t sayin’ she’s a gold digger.
But, she’s only hangin’ with award winners.

Simple. All I had to do was write the rest of it. I put that off for months. I didn’t even start it until the day before the first day of orientation and I didn’t finish until three in the morning. I wrote it, didn’t even double check it and I went to bed. I didn’t think about it much the next couple of days after because I was so worried about all my other stuff. But suddenly, the night of the boat cruise was upon me and I found myself wanting to puke my guts out. I hadn’t really done any kind of public performance since that time Gary and I did that coffee house thing for Amnesty International. That was four years ago. Even worse, I couldn’t even remember the last time that I had been in a large, party setting like this. My anti-social instincts were flaring out of control. “Breathe”, I told myself, “breathe”. I wandered around the docks a bit to collect myself, but I couldn’t get comfortable. After we boarded, I quickly ate and then after hanging out with my peoples for a bit I retreated to a corner somewhere to prepare myself for my performance. As she did all week, Betty showed up just when I needed her. She sat down at the table with me and held the lyrics as I worked on memorizing them. I was going to have them in my hand anyway, but I didn’t want to rely on them. She sat through the whole thing, like, four times. Even after that, I still wasn’t sure about the whole thing, but when showtime came I had no choice but to go.

We forced everyone into the 2nd level of the ship. The audience was smushed together, it was sauna hot and I barely had any room to move around. The lack of space also interfered with the plans of my backup dancers, Fathima, Patricia, Elena and Nena. I thought, “Is it too late to back out of this? Maybe I should just announce the awards and then jump into Lake Ontario.” I’d already gone too far though, so instead I just said, “DJ Boyd, I’m as ready as I’ll ever be. Hit the music.”

*Bum-Bum-Bum-Bum-Bum-Bum-Bum-Bum-Bum-Bum-Bum* She take my money…

So I start with the chorus, which is the easy part, and it gets a good laugh. They probably thought that’s all I was going to do. Then the verse starts and honestly, it was kind of whack:

Eighteen years, eighteen years
you graduated from high school, took you eighteen years.
Not me, I suffered through OAC.
Eventually, I made it up to UofT.

Everyone’s still smiling, still happy, but I got this feeling that any minute now they were going to turn on me. Luckily, you could read the phonebook over that beat and people would like it so they were still feeling me, or at least Mr. West, to some degree. Then I come in with the last bars of the first verse:

We ain’t gonna throw out these prizes blindly.
This isn’t an award that you should take lightly.
You’ve gotta be the winner of a category
And it’s tougher than auditioning for West Side Story.

Forget the fact that that lyric makes absolutely no sense in the context of the rap. It killed. I got one of those one of a kind crowd “OOOOOOOOOOOOHHHS!” that you only get if you’re a hot shit rapper or you just broke some guys ankles with a killer cross-over. I am now familiar with both feelings. So things are going great at this point, and I’m doing the chorus and I’m like, “One more verse, one more verse.”

First things first, for our faithful leaders.
It takes time to turn these kids into believers.
But we always watching.
Yeah, we know who’s been here since day one and the ones who just popped in.

At this point, I’m not looking at the lyrics at all and because the crowd is getting so loud it’s actually throwing my timing off. But it works great, because I’m forced to improvise a bit and change the speed an inflection of the whole thing and it’s seriously popping at this point. Then the ending:

Even if you don’t win, y’all have made it this far.
You’re shining so brightly you got me seein’ stars.
Thanks for your time, the pleasure was all mine
and I got fatter rhymes than Kevin Federline, yo!

Explosion. People just went nuts and I didn’t know how to react at all. I’m proud, excited, really embarrassed. I just bury my head in my hands, I can’t even make eye contact with anyone at this point. I’m happy that it’s over, happy to be alive. I’m losing it. Then I hear the crowd:

“ALEX! ALEX! ALEX! ALEX! ALEX! ALEX! ALEX! ALEX! ALEX! ALEX!”

One of the best moments of my life. The last time I felt this good was when I climbed that rope ladder with Sarah Tulley at the LEAD retreat. That was a long time ago. Finally, I look up and I’m like, “Thank you, thanks so much for putting up with that.” And I am incredibly grateful, truly. The hard part over, I move on to the awards and everything goes smoothly even though it’s like a thousand degrees and people are struggling to breathe. I let the presenters do their thing and get some time to relax. Michelle’s right next to me and I wrap my arm around her and give her a kiss on the head, which I think surprised her. But I couldn’t have done it without her, couldn’t have done anything this week without her, and it just came out. I constantly struggle to express how much she means to me, but this gesture was as clear as I can get.

Alex Lee. Rap superstar. One night only.

*****

$35. That’s how much money was in my wallet when I jumped into the fountain at Queen’s Park.

On Friday, I entered previously uncharted territory. During my own frosh week, I left Thursday afternoon due to some combination of feeling overwhelmed by all that I’d experienced and fatigue. I ended up missing what is, apparently, one of the most important events of Frosh Week: The SAC (Students’ Administrative Council) parade. The SAC parade is a chance for all the colleges to get together in the same spot and march through the streets of Toronto while screaming at each other and everyone else in the city. It is a magnificent sight. I got caught up in the whole thing and abandoned my executive duties for a minute, but after a while I rejoined my comrades in encouraging the kids to cheer. I still can’t get over the mixture of fear and respect that was shown by all the freshmen as I yelled “NEW COLLEGE!” at them. Who was I to be telling anyone to cheer? I’ve spent the last couple of years doing nothing but badmouthing my school and my college and now I’m promoting school spirit? Crazy.

I was most likely suffering from heat exhaustion. It was the warmest day of the week and after a while, everyone was dying to get out of the sun. I should mention now that the parade lasted about two hours. That’s a lot to ask from a group of kids who had spent the last three days running around and screaming their lungs out, but they were troopers and stuck with it as long as they could.

Finally, we ended up at Queen’s Park for the traditional fountain dive. Now, I was not planning to jump in, I assure you, and I definitely was not dressed for it. I should have realized by now that anytime there is a body of water, (see: Hart House Farm) natural or otherwise, and one or more idiots are jumping in, there is an excellent chance that I will feel compelled to join said idiots. And again, it was hot. I should have mentioned before that Max had joined me on this little adventure. I don’t recall why he was here, only that he either fell from the sky or emerged from a hideous cocoon. He was useful in that I was able to hand him my…no, I handed him a wallet and car keys that Julius had entrusted me with. It had not crossed my mind to empty my own pockets. So, earthly possessions and all, I hopped right in. As usual, I overdid it. After wading around a bit, I proceeded to hop onto the fountain itself with everyone else and allowed myself to be viciously splashed by those who remained in the water. It was refreshing. My wallet remained mostly dry during the whole ordeal and I might have gotten away with holding onto it if someone hadn’t submerged me in the waters just as I was getting out. Thanks for that, whoever you are.

Suffice to say, all my receipts and movie stubs that I’d saved over the last four months or so were ruined. I should be happy about this occurrence, because it gave me an excuse to empty the damn thing. I definitely wasn’t happy about my ruined bills. I was hellaciously thirsty even after soaking in dirty park fountain water, so I endeavoured to purchase a drink from a vending machine as soon as we got back to Wetmore. My bills, having a consistency similar to a used tissue at this point, were promptly rejected. I laid them out on the heater (which wasn’t even on) and ate what was left of my dinner. I say “what was left”, because we had ordered from Spring Rolls and my dumplings looked like appetizers to everyone else so they decided to serve themselves. I can’t blame them. Seeing that I was still thirsty, Betty sprung for my drink and I swore I’d pay her back. I couldn’t immediately, because 1) she wouldn’t take it and 2) I would feel bad giving her one of my wet $5 bills that looked disturbingly counterfeit.

Three wet fives and a twenty. After much debate, most of us agreed that no respectable establishment would take this money. I was too lazy to argue, so I got rid of it in other ways. One five dollar bill I can’t account for. Another was given to a homeless guy, to divert him away from a group of frosh outside of this club. He can probably find more use for it than I can. The last five dollar bill I left with the cheque at a diner where Julius, Andrew and I had lunch so I wouldn’t have to be around for inspection. The fate of the remaining twenty shall be revealed later.

Rewind a bit.

*****

I’d been looking forward to seeing Metric all week. Not only that, but I was excited that my peoples (Max, Shirley and William) would be dropping by to see them. Even if the week turned out to be a total disaster, at least I’d get a free concert out of it.

However, the week turned out to be so fun that I almost forgot about the concert and more importantly, I wasn’t that eager to see my old chums anymore. As the week wound down and all my highs started wearing off, I felt like reuniting with my normal friends meant that I’d have to go back to reality. Like I was being pulled back from Oz. What a nice way to think of friends, eh?

The first thing Shirley sees when she gets here is me standing on top of a hill in the middle of Queen’s Park, soaking wet from jumping in the fountain. I felt that was the image I wanted to present. It was nothing like me. Perfect. We made our way over to the back campus of University College where The Weakerthans were setting up. I felt kind of weird still, like I wasn’t sure whether I was supposed to be myself or be the guy who I’d been all week. After finding out that I’d lost one of my socks (don’t ask), Shirley took the remaining one and wrote “Big Al’s Frosh Week Sock” on it. She signed it and told me to get everyone else to do the same so that I’d always have that memento. I never got around to doing that, but I got the only signature that I wanted on there anyway. It was a wonderful gesture and I realized that maybe this new me and my old world could still get along just fine. The music of The Weakerthans fit the moment. The sun was at it’s peak and here I was with Max and Shirley (William was still at work) and I was looking up and thinking how lucky I was to have survived the week and how lucky I’ve always been to have friends who have stood by me even in the worst of times. That said, I wasn’t quite ready to settle down yet. I had business to take care of, so I bid a temporary farewell to Max and Shirley and left them to enjoy the concert.

*****

Elena Kuzmin. Here’s a picture (not great, I know). She’s the one on the right. She’s from Kazakhstan. Yes, the same country that Borat comes from. Her accent is noticeable, but not intrusive. She’s a close-talker, which I find incredibly intimidating. She’s the vice-president of the Golden Key International Honour Society. She’s not terrible looking at all and I’ve become quite fond of her.

I can definitely say that if half of my energy was spent taking care of various orientation responsibilities, the other half was spent pursuing her. I opened things up by asking her what kind of music she wanted to hear when I was DJ’ing in the quad. Ah, music. My most loyal friend and my most deadly weapon. From there, it was simply a matter of dropping the occassional “hello” and making small talk.

Well, that and playing dirty.

Some people were keeping there stuff in room 2008 at Wilson Hall. She was one of them. I asked Julius if I could be responsible for the key to that room. He obliged and everytime she needed access to her things, she had to come and talk to me. A bad trick, to be sure, but look at it this way: Every other guy on the planet is like a metahuman. They’ve all got some cool gimmick. Some dudes fly, some dudes are super strong, some even have heat vision. Me? I’m Batman. All I got is my utility belt and my wits. And the key to room 2008. The plan worked to perfection on Friday night. We were running a casino event and I was talking to Shirley and I suddenly feel someone grab my arm. It was Elena. Sure, she was just grabbing me so she could get the key, but for a couple of minutes I was gliding across a hardwood casino floor with a European beauty on my arm. I’m easily thrilled, what can I say?

Later, we went to the Hockey Hall of Fame for our last club night. Let me tell you now that the HHoF works well as a club, the only problem on this particular night was that a lot of the kids had already gone home so it was fairly empty by club standards. Again, it was a sound concept. I found Elena quickly and we agreed to leave together if the party was dead.

Eventually, we ended up at the Sigma Chi frat house. Don’t ask me why I went there. She was there, so I had to go to keep an eye on her. Julius eventually showed up too. It was cool because almost all the leaders and executives came by to congratulate him and say there good-byes for the week. They actually lifted him up on their shoulders. I’m so proud of the guy. He worked incredibly hard on this project for the last six months or so and I can tell you that it was an enormous success. He deserves all the credit in the world, he’s amazing. So after taking a swig from the communal beer pitcher, I went back to watching my lady. There was this fucker named Ron who was putting his hands all over her and I was just cursing my inability to compete with that. This is what I’m talking about. Lousy metahuman.

We went to sit down and I had to box him out so I could sit next to her. I made sure that he knew I wasn’t going to leave her side. I told everyone I was going to make sure she got home okay and I intended to stand by that. I was scraping and clawing. He was half-Israeli, half-Russian (fuck!) and he was going on about how Jewish people invented everything or some crap like that. He’s all like, “Albert Einstein. He was Jewish.” I had to get my hands dirty again.

“Yeah. He helped make the atomic bomb. Nice work on that one.”

That was surprisingly effective in shutting him up. Then I broke out the Romanian I had learned from my former neighbours to impress this other girl who was sitting with us and to look cultured in front of Elena. Again, it kind of worked. I even threw out some compliments, which I hate to be so overt about. There was this Chinese guy, Jonathan, whose name they couldn’t remember. He starts going on about how white people think that all Chinese guys look the same. Then the other girl, Katalina, says that Chinese people think all white girls look the same. So I say, “Katalina, if all the white girls looked like you and Elena, we’d be living in a better world.” Corny, but it got a reaction and that’s all I could hope for.

At the end of the night, everyone was saying their good-byes. Elena was giving out hugs and kisses. Ron and I shared the coldest “nice too meet you” handshake you’ve ever seen. Fuck that nigga. Then I walked Elena to her cab. She had $20 in Molson Taxi Money that Julius was kind enough to lend her, but she had to go all the way to Thornhill. I still had a ruined $20 bill on me and I gave it to her without hesitation. She didn’t want to take it, but I figured it’d be a lot easier for her to give it to a cab driver at four in the morning than it would be for me to use it anywhere else. Plus, when there’s a gorgeous woman looking me in the eyes, my judgment tends to become impaired. I got the last kiss on the cheek of the night and went on my merry way back to the NCSC office. That was my room for the week. I wasn’t too high or too low, I was content and at peace. And happy as hell that she didn’t end up with Ron.

*****

The most surprising thing about the whole week is that I have no chance with Elena and yet, that doesn’t matter to me at all. A month ago, I wouldn’t have even spoken to a girl like that and there I was making moves and cock-blocking dudes in a frat house basement. Again, “Do or do not. There is no try.” I was there, I was doing. That was the story of the whole orientation. That was more important to me than any romantic interest. There was no way that I was going to let a crush make or break my opinion of frosh week. I’d come too far, learned too much.

There’s so much I’m leaving out, but I’ll rein this puppy in now.

As the week ended and Monday approached, I found myself thinking that school work is going to be nothing compared to this. I was just involved in taking care of almost six hundred kids for four days. If I can’t take care of my own business, then I kind of missed the point, didn’t I? However, I’ve also learned that there are no guarantees and that nothing is concrete. I thought UofT was the coldest, most alienating environment in the country and that view was obliterated by one week of experiences. I didn’t see that coming, but I didn’t shy away from it when I realized what was happening. That’s all you can do, I guess. Not be afraid of whatever is coming. That said, I wish the best to everyone in the coming school year. Hopefully, it’s all going to work out.

Courage! What makes a king out of a slave? Courage! What makes the flag on the mast to wave? Courage! What makes the elephant charge his tusk in the misty mist, or the dusky dusk? What makes the muskrat guard his musk? Courage! What makes the sphinx the seventh wonder? Courage! What makes the dawn come up like thunder? Courage! What makes the Hottentot so hot? What puts the “ape” in apricot? What have they got that I ain’t got?