My Second Life
Copyright 1999 The Harfolk Press
Not to be copied without permission


 Chapter One
  OUTWARD AND VISIBLE SIGNS

In the summer of 1980 I thought the world was my oyster.  I was
thirty-seven.  I had an exciting and challenging senior position as the
Treasurer of The Molson Companies Limited, one of Canada's oldest and most
famous businesses.  I was married to a loving and interesting wife, and we
had two wonderful children.  We lived in a pleasant house in north Toronto.
We had a full social life and were active in the community and in the church
and in politics.
 My life was busy and satisfying, but it was often stressful. Every day I
drove to work from our house in North Toronto to the Molson offices near the
Toronto international airport. Much of the trip was along the "401", the
multi-lane highway that bisects Metropolitan Toronto. The 401 is heavily
travelled, indeed over-travelled and it was commonplace to witness
accidents, some minor, and others horrendous. Often these would cause the
traffic to gridlock as emergency vehicles cleared away torn heaps of metal
and mangled humanity and other drivers paused to gawk at the carnage.
 This drive added stress and anxiety to the beginning and end of any working
day, and now I was finding that sometimes it would leave me literally
shaking. If the traffic was light and accident-free, I was fine. I did not
bother telling Esther, my wife. Not much escapes Esther; she noticed the
shaking too, but put it down to stress on the job. She did not even raise
the subject. She became increasingly concerned when I would arrive home in
the evening so exhausted that I could not even say "Hi" or "How are you." I
had to recharge my batteries before I had the energy to greet our children
and hear anecdotes from their day, or to pet our three-year-old Airedale
terrier, Sir, who always greeted me eagerly at the door.
 Esther had also begun to observe that my driving was becoming erratic, and
that I was developing a tendency to oversteer to the right. She mentioned it
often, telling me that I had better pay attention to my driving and stop
woolgathering.
 But now it was happening more often. Esther was afraid that I would have an
accident and persistently questioned my driving ability. And when I was
driving home one day that summer an accident did. It was not serious. There
were no injuries, just a dent in my left front fender. The driver of the
other car, which was in front of me, had tried to brake on wet pavement,
skidded and spun around 360-degrees. Luckily I barely touched his car. The
police constable on the scene gave me what seemed like a long lecture on the
hazards of driving on the 401 and charged me with "following too closely." I
was able to drive on, but when I got out of the car at home, I shook for
half an hour.  I didn't tell Esther. I didn't feel like going to a friend's
birthday party that night, but I went. I had a good time, but drank too
much. I put it all down to stress.
 But, from that moment on, I began to wonder. Was Esther right? Was my
driving less than perfect? I did tend to over-steer. Still, I did not think
anything was wrong with me that paying more attention to the road and
developing better driving habits would not cure. Esther's concern was born
of love; I was foolish to have ignored it.

I had first noticed Esther Clark in Winnipeg on New Year's Day, 1967. I had
gone with my father to the annual New Year's day levée of the Archbishop of
Rupertsland at the See House, his official residence.  Archbishop Clark was
also the Primate - the head - of the Anglican Church of Canada. The levée,
an open-house reception, was a full dress occasion. The military types were
wearing their parade dress uniforms, the civilian men were in their morning
coats, if they had them, ladies wore hats and gloves and the Right Reverend
Howard Clark was attired in the court dress for a bishop - frock coat and
gaiters, and patent leather shoes with silver buckles. He looked the part,
except for an impish twinkle in his eyes that was most unepiscopal. There
was an aura about the Archbishop, and he was obviously enjoying himself.
 I was immediately attracted to Esther, one of his daughters.  I told her I
was thinking of going to a movie that afternoon. She responded with a chilly
"enjoy yourself," that left me in no doubt that I would be going alone. I
was certainly was not included in the group of friends who were invited to
go upstairs to the library for "coffee", laced with rum after the
formalities.
 I persisted. On an evening three months later, in March, 1967, I told
Esther that I loved her. She said "don't," and left Winnipeg the next day. I
lay siege to her at long distance, my weapon being a single red rose sent
each week to her apartment in Toronto. Esther finally succumbed when a rose
bloomed instead of dying on the spot. Changing florists proved to be a
strategic move! On April Fool's Day 1968 we became engaged.
 It was July when I next saw the Clark family. I was invited to stay at
their family cottage at Blue Sea Lake in the Gatineau hills. Mrs. Clark met
me in Ottawa. As she drove - Coke in one hand, ice cream cone in the other
and a box of Crackerjack wedged precariously between her knees - she pointed
out the beauty of the Gatineau Valley and various landmarks en route.
 In addition to her idiosyncratic driving, Mrs. Clark had a hostile
relationship with snakes. On my first morning at Blue Sea, she cornered a
garter snake and was about to kill it. She shouted, "Bill, get me an axe!"
 "Don't you dare, Bill, or I'll never see you again!" yelled Esther from her
second-floor bedroom, which was just above us. She then dashed down and out
of the cottage and tussled with her mother. The snake escaped.
 Later that day I noticed for the first time that the Archbishop had a fused
back. "It must be very inconvenient not being able to move your neck" I
observed tritely.
 "Oh, not at all, Bill," he gracefully responded. "It makes swimming on my
back so much easier." Howard Clark seemed an attractive but enigmatic man to
me, and I was intrigued to see the Primate of the Anglican Church of Canada
playing bridge, reading a Dorothy Sayers detective story and commenting on
politics, sometimes all at once.
  Our wedding had to be fitted in the Archbishop's tight schedule. He had
been able to offer Labour Day, September 2, 1968. The wedding took place at
St. George's-by-the-Lake, the little church near the Clark's cottage. It was
an idyllic setting. Sandra Gwyn, in her book, Tapestry of War, describes
Blue Sea as
 one of the loveliest and most lustrous of all the lakes in Gatineau
country; more than twenty miles long, fringed with cedars and silver
birches, framed by gentle, unintimidating mountains, dotted with islets and
patches of water lilies.

 Esther was brought to the Church by her brother in a canoe.  She sat on a
high wooden armchair, wearing her grandmother's wedding dress, looking
absolutely spectacular. There was a rain-shower during the service. As the
service ended, so too did the shower, and a beautiful rainbow appeared in
the window over the altar. We took this to be a portent of a long and
fruitful, though not dull, marriage. Some commented that the rainbow was a
sign from God that all tribulation was ended (Genesis, 9:13).
 After we were married, we spent every July with the Clarks at Blue Sea
Lake. Invariably we would play a rubber of bridge in the evening.  One
night, the Archbishop showed that he had his limits. Mrs. Clark had
committed two sins - bidding improperly and getting the cards greasy by
eating popcorn. Then Esther began recounting why she did not like part of
John Updike's Couples, mainly the coarse language and graphic descriptions
such as "this teenage boy was masturbating, and the semen came out with such
force that it hit the light bulb on the ceiling, and shattered it."
 "That does it!", said the Archbishop. He laid his cards on the table and
left the room with a bemused look of exasperation.
 Blue Sea became special to me, so much so that I abandoned my own family
cottage near Kenora on Lake of the Woods. It had been the scene of too many
unhappy memories. I had grown up there, but never enjoyed it because my
father's endless work projects had made it resemble a labour camp more than
a place for summer fun.
 Esther and I started our married life in Winnipeg, but left after a few
months when I had received a good job offer from a subsidiary of Citibank in
Toronto. I had started work in the investment business in Winnipeg on
graduating from the University of Manitoba in 1965. I changed jobs three
times. On each occasion the new company had  sought me out and offered me a
better job with more scope and challenge than the previous one had. The move
to Toronto was an exciting opportunity for me.
 I had worked hard for what I achieved and it was worth it. But putting
myself on the fast track in the business world put me at odds with my
father, whose modest career as a bank manger had left him embittered and
resentful. While he would always say he was proud of my achievements, the
compliments were usually backhanded and somewhat demeaning. My relationship
with my parents, particularly my father, which was never very happy, had
been deteriorating and I was glad to put some distance between us.
 Later, in Toronto, when Citibank underwent a reorganization and I needed to
find a new job, my father's often-repeated comment was, "I could have told
you that would happen."  I then moved to a good position at Wood Gundy, the
investment house.  It was a very positive career move, but it put me among
the money changers in the temple as far as my father was concerned and set
him against his oldest brother, my uncle Arch, who had had a much more
successful business career and thought the move was a good one.
 The move to Molson's came seven years later.  One day, a Friday in July,
1976, I answered the phone at about 4:30 in the afternoon. "Bill? Its Drew
McCaughey at Molson. Our Treasurer has jumped ship and gone to Weston's. I'd
like you to join us as our Treasurer. Are you still there? Good. Are you
interested? Come over to the Yacht Club on the 1:45 boat on Sunday and we'll
discuss it."
  This was just about the highest compliment possible in the investment
business. In the mid 70s, it was rare for an investment professionals to be
plucked from the analytical ranks of the brokerage industry. The job as
Treasurer of The Molson Companies Limited was a real coup. I was only 33
when I accepted the job, I had no corporate experience and I was not a
Chartered Accountant. I went to Molson in the fall of 1976. It was a job I
loved.  To be treasurer of Canada's oldest major family-controlled compoany
was an honour any young executive would cherish.  The job content was
exciting too, with much of it new to me:  commercial paper, managing the
skinking fund, financing corporate growth, and being part of the team that
worked on acquisitions and divestitures.

Shortly after we had arrived in Toronto, Esther became pregnant with our
first child. It was a difficult pregnancy - through much of it, she was
confined to bed. It was a baby that was never meant to be, Esther later
thought. The baby was born on December 31, 1969, a healthy girl, but the
birth was complicated by a full breech presentation. She had a hairline
fracture of the skull caused by the use of forceps and consequent internal
bleeding.  The doctors at the Wellesley Hospital advised transferring the
baby to the Sick Children's Hospital. I accompanied our baby daughter in a
taxi, the baby in an incubator, both of us supervised by a nurse. The
prognosis was that if the baby should live, there would likely be severe
brain damage and physical handicaps. Esther and I decided that we did not
want medical science to make the supreme effort. We would let nature take
its course.
 I spent that night with Esther's sister and her husband, Mary and Tony van
Straubenzee, much of it alone in a third floor bedroom crying.
 Early on New Year's Day, 1970, I baptized our daughter "Megan Emily", using
the words from The Book of Common Prayer. She died about half an hour later.
Esther and I buried her ashes the next summer in the family plot in Napanee,
without a clergyman present.
  With our baby daughter's death we buried dreams of the future not memories
of the past. We were devastated by the death of Megan, but did not allow it
to stop our efforts at starting a family. Our son Howard was born on May 14,
1971 and our daughter Emily on March 14, 1974. The sorrow and grief that was
associated with that first pregnancy gave way to joy and hope fulfilled.
 Our life was happy and hectic. I was a Churchwarden at Christ Church Deer
Park, Esther was involved in the Anglican Church Women, and we were both
involved in Progressive Conservative Party politics. Esther also ran the
After Four programme at Davisville School. This activity was a natural
outgrowth of her interest in arts and crafts - she did demonstrations of
gingerbread houses and Easter egg decorating at Harbourfront each year. The
chef d'oeuvres of her creative work were two large needlepoints after
Wassily Kandinsky and Pablo Picasso.
 Esther was her father's daughter. Bright and witty, fun at a party and
intellectually very curious, she would, like her father, have four books
going at once, on topics as varied as philosophy, eighteenth century
literature and psychology - the last-named was due to the career interest
acquired when she was a probation officer - and a detective story thrown in
for good measure.
 Our friends reflected our interests - politics, the church - and
professional couples. Christ Church Deer Park is a special place to us. In
the heart of midtown Toronto, this prosperous Anglican parish is where we
have met many of our closest friends.  There was just the right personal
chemistry there. Stephen Booth was the Curate in 1971 - 74; he remains among
my closest friends. Stephen is responsible, along with my father-in-law, for
stimulating my intellectual development and encouraging me to think. I was a
late bloomer. I now looked forward to the beginning of each day, because it
was sure to be interesting and fun.
 In the summer of 1980, things were going well at Molson, but there were
some interesting business challenges. The company had been on a major
acquisition programme since 1971, having acquired Beaver Lumber, a
do-it-yourself retailer, and Diversey Corporation, a specialty chemical
company. Meanwhile, a planned divestiture programme - selling off unwanted
businesses - did not raise as much money as was planned for and what money
was raised came in more slowly than our budget estimates. Then, in 1978, two
major, unplanned acquisitions were made: the specialty cleaning chemical
business of BASF Wyandotte and Le Club de Hockey Canadien - the famous
Montreal Canadiens hockey team. This was at the time of the expansion of the
National Hockey League. Molson was determined to maintain its premier
marketing position on Hockey Night in Canada, a decision that was very
expensive as it necessitated a substantial investment in advertising and
promotional rights of the new expansion teams, Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton,
Winnipeg and Quebec City. All this added up to a major cash shortfall for
Molson's and a consequent increase in short-term borrowing.
 Part of my job as Treasurer was to devise funding strategy. I had proposed
to the Board, and received authorization, for a major long-term financing.
In addition I was in charge of the project team. It was a real feather in my
cap. The financing was an issue of $75 million of convertible debentures.
 The project was progressing well, and we kept to our timetable but the
prospectus work was demanding and the hours were long and sometimes when I
got home after the drive along the 401 I was shaking with exhaustion and
stress. I was undoubtedly working under some kind of handicap but it was not
one I could identify or even recognize in myself.
 Then one day that summer, I think it was in early August, after the
preliminary prospectus had been filed, a senior vice-president who was a
relatively new employee of Molson arrived in the middle of a meeting. It was
the first interest he had shown in the issue. After taking a few minutes to
orient himself, his opening comment rebutted a point I had been making.
 "You are full of shit, Harshaw", he said in a grating English accent, and
then proceeded to make his point. It was a dramatic opening and completely
at odds with the tone of the meeting. Not to be outdone, I responded
instantly, my tongue getting the better of me, as it often does: "I may be
full of shit, but you are wrong. If you cannot make a useful contribution to
this meeting, I will have to ask you to leave."
  The tension could have been cut with a knife. Exchanges like that were
rare at Molson. In a meeting with underwriters, and two sets of lawyers,
they were unheard of. The vice president, very antagonistic, slammed shut
his briefcase, got up and strode from the room, closing the door behind him
with such violence that we were sure it must be damaged.
 By common consent, it was agreed that I was in the right and the vice
president's behaviour had been intolerable. The only problem was that he
outranked me by two levels. As things turned out, my manager and mentor, who
had brought me into Molson, left the company a few weeks later; the vice
president was now my new manager. In December he, in effect, fired me. The
execrable exchange between us was not referred to. I was given nine months
to find a new job.

Esther did not view this turn of events as a tragedy, which I did, but as an
opportunity. She knew I had always regretted not having taken law at
university. Here was an ideal opportunity to take a few years off from
corporate life and pursue that interest.  She said, "So what if we have to
scrimp for a few years? It will be worth it to see you with a job you're
happy with." I had particularly felt the inadequacy during the acquisition
and divestiture phase of my work at Molson when the lawyers seemed to have
much more influence. Alternatively, I could go back to the investment
industry in the corporate finance side of the business. Or do both.
 While I worked out my nine months at Molson, I entered a period that
included grief, guilt, inadequacy, secrecy and stupidity. These are all
natural reactions to being fired; their intensity waxed and waned with the
job prospects. The first few months were introspective, followed by
alternating periods of optimism and pessimism as job interviews were lined
up, and then did not pan out. I made a few short lists, but nothing went as
far as an offer. This surprised me as I had been doing a good job at Molson;
the problem had arisen a clash of personalities, not job performance.
 Words of my father came back to haunt me. When I had first told him that I
was considering leaving Wood Gundy to join Molson, he thought I must have
been fired. He wouldn't believe that Wood Gundy took the Molson offer as a
compliment. That is when he said: "You will fail, and when you do, by
Christ, I hope you fall so hard that you can't get up." They were prophetic
words, but hardly comforting.
 Esther and I did not stop entertaining. We were known for having parties
that were lots of fun with interesting people. I didn't lose my love of fun
or my gregariousness. The big one that Spring was a surprise party for
Esther's fortieth birthday. I had invited fifty people, all of whom came.
The party began at six in the evening and the last guest left at two-thirty
in the morning.  My driving was still nerve-wracking. It was not getting
worse, but neither was it improving as I'd hoped.
  Then in the spring of 1981, Howard, who now was ten, was out jogging with
me. I was a sporadic jogger and would take it up occasionally to try and
lose weight and limber-up. Howie said, "Dad, you must have really hurt
yourself when you fell skiing last winter. Your arm's not swinging."  I paid
no attention to his observation. After all, it didn't hurt.
 In May and June Howard and I went on two canoe trips, one to Poker Lake in
Haliburton with Stephen Booth, and the second to Algonquin Park with Tony
Graham and his son Mark. Stephen and Tony are my closest friends, yet on
neither excursion did I mention my limp arm or the fact that I was out
looking for a job. This privacy - or secrecy, if you will, was singularly
inappropriate. Tony, a doctor, is the Chief of Cardiology at the Wellesley
Hospital in Toronto and Stephen, an Anglican priest, was himself in the
middle of a combination job hunt and marriage break-up. I should have sought
their advice and counsel instead of keeping quiet and feeling sorry for
myself.
 By the early fall of 1981, not long before I was due to leave Molson, a
slight but perceptible tremor developed in my right arm.
 I was not very easy to live with while all this was going on. I felt under
a lot of pressure with the prospect of not having a job when my time ran out
and increased worry about these damned symptoms of I didn't know what. To
Esther I said, "I'm drinking more than usual - it's the stress of not
finding a job." Through all this period, Esther was as loving and supportive
of me as I could ever want. While trying to keep me on the straight and
narrow, which wasn't the easiest thing to do, Esther consistently came up
with good ideas. Her attitude was always positive, even if her patience was
a bit short at times!
 "Drinking is one of the stupidest things you can do," she said. "Supposing
you had an accident when you've had too much. Or, what if you have a job
interview and the tremor is there? They'd think you were hungover! Besides,
you can't afford it. Smarten up! Stop drinking at lunch."
 It was true, I was drinking at lunch, with a couple of fellows at the
office. It was all on the expense account, so affording it wasn't an issue.
 After my last day at Molson, September 30, 1981, there were tearful
partings on my part, because this was the job I had loved, was proud of and
had been good at. Molson gave me an honourable settlement. Then I went out
with my colleagues and wound up getting very drunk. We all did.
  No job. I was getting desperate. The limp right arm persisted with a
tremor, I tried to conceal it by putting my hand in my trouser pocket, but
then I feared I would be suspected of being a player of pocket pool.  So,
that was not a viable option. I must have tried every conceivable way of
hiding my right hand - behind a chair, sitting on it, in my jacket in the
Napoleonic style, behind my back ... the list could go on. The tremor was
not so bad that people noticed it immediately, but if anyone looked
carefully, there was no way to hide it.
 Finally, in late October an offer came from Scotiabank. The offer was given
in a most off-hand way. The executive who interviewed me said, "Well, you're
not wearing Kodiaks or blue jeans; I guess you can have a job."  No physical
examination was required. It was not what I wanted and the pay was twenty
percent less than I had been earning at Molson's, but it was a job. I took
it, against Esther's advice, because I felt the obligation to support the
family. It was a job I learned to hate.
 Winter's treat was a limp in my right leg. I thought, "it's probably
nothing, it will go away. It's all part of the stress of having to find a
job." I told Esther and the children that I had tripped and fallen and
twisted my ankle while jogging, and yes, I had hurt my shoulder when I was
skiing the previous winter. I tried to ignore these problems: surely they
would go away as I got settled in my new job, and that was just a matter of
time. But still I wondered. Had the tremor been the reason why some
companies never went beyond the first interview, or why some headhunters had
not shortlisted me? Would Scotiabank fire me if it continued?
 Esther was persistent. "Bill, there's more to it than twisting your ankle
and hurting your shoulder last winter. These things are lasting too long.
You have got to see Dr. Polak. It could be something serious." Jarda Polak
had been our family doctor for several years.
 Finally, I yielded to her unremitting pressure and arranged an appointment.
On the day, I was apprehensive; scared shitless is a better, though less
elegant expression. Why? It was fear of the unknown. I was all set to put
the symptoms down to a hangover. We had been to a fund-raising dinner for
David Crombie, then the Conservative Member of Parliament for Rosedale, the
night before.
 Dr. Polak did all the usual tests for a regular check-up. When I mentioned
the tremor, my arm not swinging and the slight limp, and tried to pass it
off as the result of too much drinking, his interest picked up. He had me do
a few tests which emphasised agility - touching my nose and then a moving
pencil, opening and closing my hand and tapping my toes. Then he tested me
with a sharp needle to see if there was feeling in every part of my body.
 "There's more to this than occasionally drinking too much or the stress of
looking for and adapting to a new job, Bill." But the usually very open
Jarda Polak didn't give a hint of what he thought it might be.
  The session finished very unsatisfactorily. He gave me no hint of what he
thought was the problem. Instead, he said, "I'm going to refer you to Ron
Macdonald. He's the Chief of Neurology at the Wellesley Hospital. He'll get
to the bottom of this."
 As I left, I was no further ahead than I was when I went in to his office.
All I knew was that now I had to see a specialist. For what reason, I did
not know. My apprehension was mounting.
 Dr. Polak's secretary called a few days later with an appointment to see
Dr. Macdonald in mid-February. I counted the days. At last, I would find out
what was wrong with me, if anything.