McMaster: The perfect school for me

Writing Life: 27

(Warning: Far too many fresh-faced photos ahead featuring an earlier version of me.)

Growing older brings many gifts, and a few trials. I’d rather not dwell on the trials, so let’s focus on the gifts. One of them is hindsight. Looking back on my university years (1978-84), I now know—and I think I knew this back then—McMaster was the perfect school for me. And it all could have gone another way with unknowable results. You see, McMaster was my third choice. I’d applied to study engineering at the University of Toronto, Queen’s University, and McMaster. Sometimes things just work out the way they’re supposed to.

Mac was the only school that accepted me for engineering. Let’s just say it narrowed down my choices… to one. So it was an easy call. My marks in high school were not bad, but the standards to enter engineering at U of T and Queen’s were slightly out of reach for me, academically speaking. So McMaster took me in and it changed my life. I’m lucky it was 1978. If I were applying today, Mac would never have accepted me.

University Hall, one of the original McMaster buildings.

I hadn’t even qualified for admission to residence, so I spent my first three years at Mac living on King Street, just down the road from the campus. I fell in love with McMaster the day I arrived in September of 1978. I quickly developed a close circle of friends with whom I remain tight forty years later. And I threw myself into my engineering studies, knowing full well that if I wanted to stay, I had to pass.

Was I ever that young (or that skinny)?

I did little else in my first year beyond my course work, and there was a whole lot of it. I liken it to drinking from a firehose. As I recall, McMaster accepted about 500 first year engineering students, but only about 220 would pass through to second year. I desperately wanted to be among the lucky 220. And, miracle of miracles, somehow, I was.

In second year, I figured I could spare some time and bandwidth to experience a bit more of what universities in general, and McMaster in particular, offer students beyond the classroom. I briefly wrote for the student newspaper, started attending lectures, films, plays, and concerts, and yes, I occasionally visited the campus pubs. I’d always had an interest in politics, so I started sniffing around the McMaster Students Union (MSU) and its legislative body, the Student Representative Assembly (SRA). I met student leaders who were active in various social causes and the fight for student rights. I wanted in. To make a long story short, while maintaining my marks, I threw myself into student politics. I was elected to the SRA representing my fellow engineering students and served for four years. I was elected Vice-President of the MSU—a full-time job in the summer and a part-time job in the school year which necessitated reducing my course load and extending my stay at Mac. Then I was elected Speaker of the Assembly, which developed meeting management skills that served me well for my entire career. Finally, as I was in my last term before graduating with my engineering degree, I decided to run for President of the MSU—a full time job—which kept me at Mac for a sixth year (yes, I somehow managed to win).

And by the way, I did actually graduate with my engineering degree. Believe me, no one was more surprised than I!

From the McMaster Yearbook, 1983.

It’s now been 40 years since I was elected MSU President, an event that altered the course of my life and opened so many doors to new opportunities and personal growth.

My campaign poster featured my grad photo with my convocation gown cropped out. The post-election coverage in the Silhouette. Posing in my office, my rotary phone on the desk behind me.

I could write a book about my time in university politics, and in the national and provincial student movements, in which I was an active participant. The student movement nurtured my interest in social change and politics. In those years, McMaster had earned a reputation for leadership in national student affairs and I had no desire to tarnish it. So I attended all the conferences, joined the executive of the Ontario Federation of Students (OFS), presented OFS’s submission to the Royal Commission on the Economic Union and Development Prospects for Canada (colloquially known as the Macdonald Commission), and even chaired a provincial conference we held at Mac. It was a very busy and utterly fascinating time for me.

Chairing the CFS-O conference at Mac in 1983.

In the throes of debating some now forgotten issue at an Assembly meeting, though undoubtedly of earth-shattering import at the time. And yes, the pale yellow sweater vest was all the rage back then... honest!

My time in campus politics led directly to my first post-McMaster job on Jean Chrétien’s Liberal Leadership campaign in the summer of 1984, and my subsequent political jobs on Parliament Hill and at Queen’s Park.

Beyond student politics

But McMaster gave me more than my interest in social justice and politics. First of all, I met my future wife when campaigning in her residence. I knocked, she opened her door, and that was it. We’ve now been married for more than 35 years. Had I not been involved on campus, it’s quite possible we’d never have met. So I have much more to thank McMaster for than my early career in politics and an engineering degree.

Nancy Naylor et moi at the Fireball, Mac’s annual engineering formal. All these years later, we’re still together. She still looks the same, and I… not so much.

As well, a group of my closest engineering friends at Mac and I formed a rock band while on campus that was more fun than I ever thought possible. As engineering students, we didn’t have a lot of time to rehearse, but I like to think we were a pretty tight band back in the day. We played around campus and even had a gig at a downtown Hamilton bar. As I’ve noted in an earlier piece, I started out as the lead singer and rhythm guitar player but only because no one else could sing better. We eventually auditioned a new lead singer who turned out to be none other than Andy Maize, who went on to cofound the great Canadian band, Skydiggers. We like to say we gave Andy his start in the music business. Skydiggers is still playing and touring with a very large and dedicated following.

(l-r) Performing an original song called Farewell Hamilton Hall at Student Recognition Night as my term as President ended. Asleep with my beloved Gibson electric guitar. Playing in the band…such a good time.

A gratuitous blurry band shot from 1982. Andy Maize and I sharing a mic.

The band still gets together each summer to relive our youth, dust off the guitars, keys, and amps, and jam until the wee hours—well, “wee hours” is now a relative term.

My “archives” (such as they are)

I still have strong ties to Mac. Back in 2010, Mills Memorial Library at McMaster contacted me about “acquiring,” cataloguing and storing my so called “papers” at Mac—my official “archives.” I was not aware at the time that I had “papers” or “archives” to donate, but apparently I did. Over the years I have turned over boxes and boxes of materials, most of which focus on my writing life. On four occasions since 2010, I’ve submitted new shipments of materials—what they call accruals—for my archives.

I have no idea why any future grad students would want to refer to my archives for research purposes, but I was certainly honoured my alma mater reached out to me. Now that I know I have “papers,” I can’t think of anywhere else I’d rather they were gathered, preserved, and available for review (even if I’m the only one reviewing them!). And I should point out that it’s not all “paper.” There’s also an extensive 26 GB digital archive I pulled together of everything from the chapter-by-chapter podcast audio files for my first six novels to photographs and early notes for each book.

Wrapping up…

I don’t really know where I’d be without my years at McMaster. What’s more, I don’t know who I’d be. In the end, I’m grateful and lucky that I ended up at Mac back in the fall of 1978 (student #7802478). Would I have ever earned an engineering degree, met my future wife, worked in politics or written novels had I studied at a different university? Who knows? But I suspect my life might have ended up very differently. All hail McMaster!

---

Thanks for enduring this walk down memory lane. Do consider subscribing and sharing if you haven’t already. See you next week.