Interesting Conversation

I had an interesting conversation yesterday morning while commuting downtown on the GO Train. Before I describe that conversation, I came across an article on the online version of The Atlantic Monthly on the recent Canadian Elections:

Canadian Elections

Okay, the conversation. Yesterday, while on the way to work on the GO train, a gentleman in his mid 50’s, sat in the seat across from me. He had jeans, a denim jacket, a Toronto Maple Leafs baseball cap, and a duffel bag stuff with books. He looked somewhat like a Jack Kerouac literary type of fella. I had not seen him on the GO Train before (as I usually see the same folks day after day) and assumed that it was a one time trip to the Union Station.

I had on an ND windbreaker. More specifically, it says “ND Irish” on the left side of the windbreaker. The gentleman spotted it and pointed to it and said “Notre Dame eh ?” I said yes and expected him to make a remark about the football team. Not having too many people up here to talk college football (and I’m dying to talk college football with ANYBODY!!), I thought that here was the rare opportunity to talk about one of my passions, college football ! Yeah, let’s talk college football !! The greatest thing since sliced bread !!

I stoically anticipated his football remark. Instead, he said “hey, they’ve got a pretty good hockey program.” I was taken aback by this unexpected comment and I froze for a split second. It occurred to me that was true. The ND Hockey team had made it to the Final Four in the past couple years and has turned into a powerhouse under Jeff Jackson, who has done one of the most impressive coaching jobs in the history of ND sports. So I responded in the affirmative and we talked about that. Only a Canadian would bring up hockey first instead of football in reference to ND sports !! I got a chuckle out of that. He went on to talk about the history of Irish people in Quebec and about an Irish bookstore that was in Montreal. A pretty interesting conversation. Alas, football was only briefly mentioned....he did know that Joe Theismann and Joe Montana had graduated from ND. That was the extent of the college football conversation. Oh well.