Today is my 55th birthday.
Which feels weird to write because, I still feel like I’m 33. Except when I have to go up a large flight of stairs, at which point I feel like I’m about 66. And my wife would say that I have the mentality of a 13 year old. Which all averages out to 37.3333334. So really, I’m closest in my estimation.
Point is, I’m not sure exactly what 55 SHOULD look like. The only real point of references for me are old “Freedom 55” commercials from London Life insurance that I remember watching when I was in my twenties and thinking “wow, 55 looks ollllllld”. And to be fair, 55 year olds DO look old to people in their twenties. And apparently parents look even older to their children who aren’t in their teens yet (my youngest daughter says I look like I’m about 76).
Anyway the premise of those old “Freedom 55” spots was that a person was meeting their future self and that future self was very self-assured because they had made sound financial decisions for two or three decades. So now they’re retired and have time to do things like sail around the world or hang out at the beach all day or do pottery like Patrick Swayze and Demi Moore in the movie “Ghost” (a reference you may only get if you’re above 55).
But things didn’t work out that way for me.
I quit an advertising job in my late twenties to pursue comedy. In Canada. Something that any sane financial advisor would advise against. I started doing spots around Toronto, some paid, some not. I got on to the “fast track” at YukYuk’s, which meant I got to do 7 minute spots on Monday and Tuesday nights. I began to tour around to exotic places like Ajax, Ontario. Or sometimes places down south like… Windsor, Ontario.
My first big comedy tour out west found me at the Yuk Yuk’s comedy club in Calgary where I quickly learned that jokes about things in Ontario didn’t fly in Alberta. I did a solo show in a place called Fairview, Alberta which was the closest I’d come to instigating a full-on bar brawl with my comedy.
But with every show I grew a little more confident. I watched every comedian that performed on the shows I was on and learned from watching them what worked and, much more importantly, what didn’t. I learned that the comedians who described themselves as “hilarious” with no hint of irony were usually the least funny.
Eventually I built up enough trust from comedy booking agents and repeat audiences, that I travelled pretty much non-stop across Canada and around the world including regular stops in my two favourite non-Canadian but Canadian-like countries: Australia and Ireland. I felt very, very fortunate. But also very, very transient since I had all my things in storage and was literally a person of “no-fixed address” for a pretty good chunk of time. This dawned on me while sitting alone in a hotel in Northern England, watching news where a crime had been committed by a man of “no-fixed address” (note: the man wasn’t me).
So I decided then and there that when I got back to Canada I was going to get an address, and maybe start a life that was just a little more normal. But not too normal. Because all normal and no comedy makes Steve a dull boy.
Little did I know that an offer would come to host a show called “The Debaters” on CBC Radio. A show which pitted Canadian comedians against each other in a very loose debate format with topics ranging from “pie vs cake” to “should Canada make reasonable accomodations for other cultures?” I had listened to the pilot for the show. I had participated as a Debater a couple of times. I had guest-hosted once. But now, just when I was searching for a little stability in a life of comedy (a daunting task for someone who had no desire to relocate to the U.S.) opportunity came calling. Literally, producer Tom Anniko called me. On the phone. No video, just phone. Might even have been a “landline” (ask your great grandparents).
That phone call gave me an opportunity to do something only a few lucky comedic entertainers in Canada get: to make a living making comedy on stages all across Canada and share those stages with some of Canada’s best comedians.
That was 20 years ago, almost to the day now, I’m still fortunate enough to be hosting The Debaters, to be entertaining theatres full of Canadians several times per year, and to not have to rely on the country in our basement to make a decent living.
So, as I turn 55 and look back on almost 30 years as a comedian and almost 20 years as host of the world’s most listened to comedy debates (and not just because we’re the only ones. But that probably helps) I’m grateful. Grateful to the creator of The Debaters, Richard Side, for dreaming up a format that showcases Canadian comedians. I’m grateful to CBC for providing us the opportunity to travel all across Canada, year after year, and help Canadians laugh. And, as strange as it sounds, I’m grateful that, financially, I am in NO position to retire just yet. My “Freedom 55” commercial would be me on a stage, beside a younger me, with the young me saying “we’re still doing this? And present day me saying “fucking right we are bud!”
Comedy has the power to keep us sane in otherwise insane times. Canadian comedians are among the best in the world at it. And I am one of the luckiest people in the world to get to practice it, year after year, across Canada and beyond.
So, as I turn 55 today, I say thanks to all those who have laughed with me over the years. And whom I hope will keep laughing with me for many more years to come. Because as far as I can tell, 55 is the new 35. In that I’ll have to keep working for at least another 20 years. And I hope to help you laugh, no matter what age you are, sometime soon.
Oh, and I WILL being taking advantage of discounts at Shoppers Drug Mart now. Which may single-handedly be the best thing so far about turning this age.