July 10: Key chains
My first key chain was a piece of string tied into a loop. On it hung
a red key, which opened the front door to my family’s house in
southwest Calgary. I guess I was in Grade 4 or Grade 5 and my parents
had decided I was responsible enough to be home alone for an hour or so
after school (they both worked.) I’m not sure where my sister and
brother were during that time, but I was pretty stoked to get almost 60
minutes to read, play Atari, or just goof around.
Soon I started garnering other keys. I had a bike lock. I got a job on the weekend sweeping up at a local printing press and I was given a key to the office. I needed a key chain.
The key chain I was given was a rhombus-shaped tongue of red plastic. It was a promotional item handed out by a Calgary insurance company. In Grade 8, I made myself a key chain in shop class. I made it by pouring granules of plastic into a mold that was shaped like the flag of Canada. Stuck it in the over, waited a few minutes, and voila. Had myself a new key chain.
Somewhere in my adolescence, I found myself in a car where the driver had, what appeared to be, a makeshift pair of female breasts as his key chain. I was in a bar once and some big dude in a leather jacket put his keys on the bar and I saw that the key chain said “Eat Shit and Die.” I used to know a girl who had a key chain that said “One Tequila, two Tequila, Three Tequila, Floor.”
Today, my key chain is a caribiner with the Calgary Flames logo on it. I have reached the point in my life where I like my personal effects to have Flames logos on them. I have a Flames wallet, a Flames mousepad, several Flames mugs and I am typing this on a Calgary Flames keyboard. Soon I will go to sleep and I will wake up to my Calgary Flames alarm clock.
I suppose I insist on all this Flames stuff because it’s a way of maintaining some sort of spiritual connection with my native Calgary.
But you know… key chains are pretty interesting things. They have the capacity to be great conversation starters. Once, at the newspaper,we asked our readers what was on their key chains but no one said anything that I remember.
Soon I started garnering other keys. I had a bike lock. I got a job on the weekend sweeping up at a local printing press and I was given a key to the office. I needed a key chain.
The key chain I was given was a rhombus-shaped tongue of red plastic. It was a promotional item handed out by a Calgary insurance company. In Grade 8, I made myself a key chain in shop class. I made it by pouring granules of plastic into a mold that was shaped like the flag of Canada. Stuck it in the over, waited a few minutes, and voila. Had myself a new key chain.
Somewhere in my adolescence, I found myself in a car where the driver had, what appeared to be, a makeshift pair of female breasts as his key chain. I was in a bar once and some big dude in a leather jacket put his keys on the bar and I saw that the key chain said “Eat Shit and Die.” I used to know a girl who had a key chain that said “One Tequila, two Tequila, Three Tequila, Floor.”
Today, my key chain is a caribiner with the Calgary Flames logo on it. I have reached the point in my life where I like my personal effects to have Flames logos on them. I have a Flames wallet, a Flames mousepad, several Flames mugs and I am typing this on a Calgary Flames keyboard. Soon I will go to sleep and I will wake up to my Calgary Flames alarm clock.
I suppose I insist on all this Flames stuff because it’s a way of maintaining some sort of spiritual connection with my native Calgary.
But you know… key chains are pretty interesting things. They have the capacity to be great conversation starters. Once, at the newspaper,we asked our readers what was on their key chains but no one said anything that I remember.
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