How Do I Know I’m Canadian?
1. When I go to a party with people from another country, no one expects me to be interesting.
2. I know all the words to my national anthem, except the French ones, and the tune is not that hard.
3. Feeling proud that Alan Thicke, Alex Trebek, and BTO are all Canadian, and then realizing where the hell else would they come from?
4. Being able to dress like I just woke up.
5. Underwear with the Toronto Maple Leafs emblem on the crotch.
6. Feeling no pressure to know a lot about wine.
7. Being admired by people from other countries for not being American.
8. Able to feel like an intellectual by reading Farley Mowat and Pierre Berton.
9. Feeling deep down inside that I have this innate ability to use snowshoes.
10. Being considered polite by everyone in the world, except my mom, who wishes I would “just smarten up.”
11. Sex education from the Eaton’s catalogue.
12. Lying in bed at night and wondering what Casey and Finnegan are really like.
13. Can say tundra with a straight face.
14. Friends think of me as a dreamy-eyed romantic when I say: “Someday I’m going to take the train to Nova Scotia.”
15. Don’t ask me why, but always feeling this twinge of pride whenever someone mentions that Montreal is the second largest French-speaking city in the world.
16. Knowing instinctively what time it is in Toronto.
17. Knowing deep in my heart that no matter what the sport or where it’s being played, the refs are always against us.
18. Going to a hot tub party where people wear bathing suits.
19. Find myself thinking about sending off to Hinterland Who’s Who for “further information on the loon.”
20. Really not caring whether a person is communist or Jewish, or Roman Catholic, or white, or black, or red, or Social Credit: just whether they make noise after 9:30 p.m.