Glen Point Blank
I saw the movie Grosse Pointe Blank last night. I laughed, yet it left me feeling really, really depressed.
Grosse Pointe Blank depressed me the same way I presume the film Titanic depresses the survivors of the Titanic disaster. It depressed me because I saw too much of my own life in the story. You see, Grosse Pointe Blank is about a hit man attending his ten-year high school reunion and realizing that he hasn’t done anything special with the past ten years of his life. Now, I’m no hit man, but aside from that, the scenario is dead on. My ten-year reunion is next summer. And I haven’t done anything special with my life, either.
Thanks to this accursed flick, I have re-lapsed into what I call my “mid-half-life crisis.” This is a lot like a mid-life crisis, but as I am only 26—and I expect modern medicine to keep me alive until at least 100—“mid-half-life crisis” seems a more appropriate term. It goes something like this: “Good God, what have I been doing all these years? Seriously, what in the hell have I been doing? Have I wasted my youth? Am I still wasting my youth? Dammit, I must do something significant by my reunion! But that’s next freakin’ year! What can I possibly do with the time I have left?”
In light of these anxieties, I have made a few life decisions. First, I will finally bite the bullet and graduate from university next spring. It seems to me that if one shows up at one’s ten-year high school reunion, having spent nine of the intervening years at university, and still hasn’t obtained a Bachelor’s degree, then one is clearly some kind of moron. People, I refuse to be that kind of moron.
I shall graduate with that most honourable of degrees, the Bachelor of General Studies. However, I am shocked to learn that SFU does not offer a graduate program in General Studies. Nor does any other university I am aware of. People, this is bullshit! What if I want to go on in General Studies?
This brings me to decision number two. After graduation I will lobby the university to start a graduate program in General Studies, of which I will be the first student. Ultimately, I intend to be the world’s first Doctor of General Studies—the ultimate degree for those who like to live dangerously. You see, given Pope’s axiom that “a little learning is a dang’rous thing,” and given that a Doctorate in General Studies would certify that one has minimal learning in a stupefyingly vast array of subjects, a holder of a Doctorate in General Studies must therefore be one of the most dangerous people on the planet. Or dang’rous, as the case may be.
But that’s a long-term plan. What about the reunion? Aside from getting my BGS, what can I do before then? What can a guy do to become famous and successful in just under nine months?
Frankly, I don’t know. But I must always be careful not to turn to the Dark Side. For it is a well-documented fact that if you aren’t famous, you can always achieve fame by killing someone who is. This is particularly relevant to me because I work as a film extra, and have the opportunity to kill celebrities on a regular basis.
In fact, just the other week I was on the set of Prozac Nation with Christina Ricci and Anne Heche. If I were packing heat I could have offed them both, point blank, real easy-like. This would have garnered me instant fame, though not particularly the sort I’m hoping for. Also, I probably wouldn’t be permitted to attend my reunion, which would kind of sabotage the whole point of the exercise. For these reasons, plus the fact I was brought up to consider wanton murder an unacceptable act, I have decided that celebrity killing is not for me.
Well, maybe that’s not entirely true. If I reach mid-half-old age and still haven’t done anything notable, perhaps then—and only then—I may consider celebrity killing as a fall-back position. However, in this event it is unlikely that I would kill Christina Ricci or Anne Heche. The way they smoke, I doubt they’d still be around.
So here I am. Less than a year to go until the big reunion. No degree. No acclaim. No fame. But today, as they say, is the first day of the rest of my life. You know what? To hell with the reunion! That’s small stuff. From now on, I’m going to concentrate on the big picture. As of this moment, I solemnly swear to dedicate my every waking moment to ensuring that when I am gone, my obituary will read something like this:
Glen Callender UFA. Born, raised and lowered in Port Alberni, British Columbia. Fled Port Alberni shortly after high school and spent most of the next decade skulking around Simon Fraser University, occasionally taking classes and concentrating his efforts on writing for The Peak, the university’s student newspaper. After graduation, Glen unsuccessfully lobbied SFU to introduce a graduate program in General Studies. Following this he lobbied the Alberni District Secondary School Alumni Association to cancel its ten-year reunion for his grad class, also unsuccessfully.
Over the next few years Glen did a lot of amazing stuff, resulting in his meteoric rise to fame. He felt especially vindicated when SFU, in light of his decades of exemplary work as the university’s most famous graduate, bestowed him with the world’s first Honourary Doctorate in General Studies.
Finally, at the age of 99, Glen lived his greatest dream when he was invited to the Academy Awards to receive a special Oscar for Lifetime Achievement. At the end of his acceptance speech he shouted, “I know I’m already famous, but what the heck!” and detonated a powerful explosive device hidden in his suit. Glen and everyone in the audience were killed, except for Hollywood’s oldest living actresses, Christina Ricci and Anne Heche, who were out back having a smoke. It was the largest on-air celebrity massacre in the history of the Academy Awards, and a fitting end for one of rural Canada’s most colourful personalities.
This, dear reader, is the future I have chosen. But as the old Chinese proverb goes, “a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.”
Step one: try to avoid seeing Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion. •
Originally published in The Peak, July 10 2000. I finally graduated from university in 2002, although I wisely changed my program to a more lucrative English-Humanities joint major with a Psychology minor.
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Personal e-mail received from an online reader:
I hope I have the right email here. I just read your piece on Grosse Pointe Blank and just about fell out of my chair. I’m on my 10th year reunion and I am a product of the Grosse Pointe School System up till my last year which I left GP North and moved to northern MI. I really laughed to see some of the snots from that area get pegged to the wall. They even have one street in Grosse Pointe Farms called Provincial that would blow your mind away to see all the castles on it. The culmination is the home of Edsel Ford at the end. Of course if you don’t live there you have security follow you in and out, how cute. I might want to steal someones shrubs.
The funny thing is some Grosse Pointers live in their own world and always complain about how the blacks ruined Detroit. In fact, if your black and drive into Grosse Pointe you get run out fast by the local police unless your one of the few that live there.
The point I’m getting to is that I returned to Grosse Pointe about two years ago after Christmas to see how it changed. I not get two blocks into Grosse Pointe Farms and I get pulled over. I guess a Geo Prizm isn’t popular, especially when not washed. I got the full service including “Where are you going? What is your business here? How long do you intend to stay?” It was like talking to Customs. I even had to get out of the car for a minute so he could take a closer look inside. It finally ended with me having a few words for him and off we go. The tour was neat but it was like I stuck out like a sore thumb. Me wearing my beat up camo jacket and jeans.
What I learned from GP is that if you never leave, you will never see what life is like on the unpainted side of the picket fence. Im sure Vancouver has a well-to-do area were others can look but, your not really welcome. All I can say is, good fences make good neighbors my ass!!
Thanx for the article Glen. That really hit an old cord in me. Hehe
Sometimes, I’m not quite sure what planet my readers are living on.
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