In America, in the early sixties, we were also starting to see the political and social upheaval that would dominate the country through the decade. None of that was happening in Ottawa. After graduating from Sudbury High, I returned there to attend the University of Ottawa. I had no money, and neither did Dad, so I had to pay my way through school with part-time jobs, such as processing tax forms for the Canadian Revenue Agency. I still kept in touch with Big John and Father Danis, and they looked out for me.
Father Danis would lend me money and take me out to dinner. But he refused to wear his vestments in public. He wanted to blend in but he would wear the most god-awful Hawaiian shirts you could imagine. He figured, Nobody’s going to know I’m a priest. So he’d have on his black pants, his black shoes, and a Hawaiian shirt. In Ottawa. In October. Yep, nobody’s gonna know.
Growing up, I wanted to either be a pilot, a doctor, or the prime minister of Canada. Once I got to college, I realized I could be a pilot no matter what occupation I was pursuing. All I had to do was take flying lessons. So I pushed that aside. I did briefly consider going into medicine. Father Danis had set up the faculty of medicine at the University of Ottawa, and he was urging me to go that route. But working part-time to pay for school, I was starting to get tired of going to class. That made me push medicine aside, and once I discovered broadcasting, I abandoned any political aspirations.
I majored in philosophy—specifically Thomistic philosophy, based on the teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas. We studied ethics, criteriology, and metaphysics. I did not choose this major because I was a brooding teenager plagued by existential quandaries. I chose it out of convenience. The classes were from nine to noon and allowed me to work in the afternoons and evenings in order to pay for school. I didn’t know what I wanted to do after I graduated, and philosophy seemed like a good subject to pursue until I figured out where I was and what I wanted to do with my life.
I’m glad I studied philosophy. I think that a philosophical outlook will help you no matter what you are doing. Philosophy helps you in terms of acknowledging some sense of perspective in your life and in the world around you. I have always tried to approach life with what I call the “reasonable-man attitude.” If you have some sense of perspective, you are not likely to get too high or too low.
And in one way, studying philosophy in Latin did help prepare me for a career as a quiz show host: if nothing else, it taught me how to pronounce Nietzsche.