Tell Me, Tell Me, Tell Me the Answer

Back in the early aughts, yours truly donned the patented blue polyester uniform of a Parliamentary Tour Guide. The job combined two of my finest qualities: the ability to spend hours explaining things I find interesting to a captive audience, and being right about everything, all the time. 

There would, of course, often be that one person who wanted to play "stump the tour guide" by asking the most random, specific question they could think of such as:

1. What is the weight of the building? 
2. Who was the first person to enter the building using the tunnel from the East Block?
3. How many doorknobs are there?

There may be a better feeling than putting some smug troll in his place by instantly responding, but young Floyd had to yet to experience it. The smugness would slowly change to confusion as I rattled off the answers without hesitation: Approximately 33,000 metric tonnes when vacant! The legislative assistant to then-Fisheries Minister Brian Tobin! 1,464, including yourself!  

I'm proud to say that in all my years of tour guiding, not a single one of these jackasses stumped me, by which I mean that no one was able to make up a question so asinine, so nonsensical, so blatantly in bad faith that I could not instantly respond, thanks to another two of my fine qualities: the ability to make shit up on the spot, and deliver it with confidence. 

It's not that I couldn't say "I don't know". I could, and did, when there were genuine questions because, much to my continued chagrin, I did not and still do not know everything about everything. But sometimes, sometimes, "I don't know" is too hard to say. 

Not just when my trivial intellectual supremacy is at stake, though. Sometimes it's too hard to say because it's upsetting to the person asking the question. Sometimes, the question isn't an inane, useless waste of time, but a sincere expression of real, meaningful interest. Sometimes, the question is "Is it terminal cancer?". Not always in those words, but it's there. I care about you, friend/wife/mother/daughter/sister/loved one. Is this going to kill you? How can I help prevent that?

And I hate hate hate not knowing that answer. But I can't just make something up. Not just because Google is a thing now and even the smuggiest smugs who ever smugged can bring a mobile encyclopedia to a battle of wits.  In this case, there are ACTUAL CONSEQUENCES to getting it wrong, in the form of causing pain to people I care about deeply, which is not at all satisfying as compared to, say, telling some doofus, with authority and a straight face, that the person who first defecated inside the House of Commons was prime minister/architect of genocide Sir John A. MacDonald.

And there is absolutely nothing I can do about that. I don't know the answer because nobody knows the answer. Cancer is a wily beast, and statistics, though eminently valuable at a population level, are about as helpful to an individual as a fart during Question Period. (Hell, as an answer during Question Period).  But at this point, that's all I have. I know that 1 in 3 people with my diagnosis survive more than five years. I know that my gender and age bestow a small but significant statistical advantage—as do the unfair privileges attached to my race, class, education level, proximity to a treatment centre, otherwise good health history and lack of visible disabilities. 

I also know that I am fortunate to not have to worry about being bankrupted by treatment, and to have loving friends and family who can support me, a job that has been flexible and understanding, and an incredible team of medical professionals and staff dedicated to my care. 

But I don't know if that's enough. And only time will tell. 

Time, with all its elusive power, forever out of mortal grasp, but that we nonetheless try to capture in our own ways...

...such as the Parliament's iconic Peace Tower clock, home to an impressive 53-bell, 4 1/2 octave carillon. What's that? Why yes, I do know which single song required the use of the most bells, sir. It was an impromptu concert by an aspiring carilloner who snuck away mid-tour and made it nearly through the entirety of Bohemian Rhapsody, until he was stopped mid-mamma mia! by a veteran security guard from Penetanguishine, who forced her way into the room using only Lester B. Pearson's antique spittoon and, per protocol, sternly rebuked the scoundrel for ignoring Canadian content laws. 

(Yup. Still got it.)