Read chapter one

by Allen Zeesman

It’s simple. I never belonged—anywhere, to anything, or to anyone. I had roles, and those roles included relationships. But that is not belonging.

I was born in Montreal, the son of a second-generation Canadian Jewish father whose parents had emigrated from the Pale of Settlement. My mother was a French-Canadian Catholic from an old family whose father had been a lumberman in Dalhousie, New Brunswick. She converted to Judaism in order to marry my father. My parents worked extremely hard in those early years, trying to get ahead. Meanwhile, I was raised by young French-Canadian women from small towns in Quebec whom my mother found through her family networks. Nothing quite fit together.

We lived in a Jewish neighborhood where all the kids went to the public school around the corner. I, on the other hand, attended a private Jewish school on the other side of the city, riding the bus every day. They came home early with no homework. I arrived late with hours to do. And I also had to practice piano. Alone.

When I entered high school, I was already big and strong; I played sports, though I was never truly good. But I made one friend: a Japanese kid from the neighborhood named Kenny. We had each other and no one else. Kenny was an excellent student and, four years later, went on to McGill. I never studied; no one really cared. I finished high school and stayed right there. I didn’t see Kenny again, except for a short dinner forty years later.

No one knew what to do with me. My parents were busy with their own lives, so my mother suggested I try living in Israel. Why not? I had never thought of it or wanted it, but they were going to pay. So I went.

The author and his mother in Jerusalem
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I lasted about two years there: one at university, one in the desert growing peaches, and a few months wandering the country, playing Gordon Lightfoot songs on my twelve-string guitar in little teahouses. But I didn’t belong there either.

Back in Canada, walking along Stanley Street in Montreal, I saw an ad for a programming course. I thought: better than nothing. I took it and got a job at a small local company; they hired me because I forgot to ask how much they paid. They liked that absent-mindedness. I worked hard and did well. But when the company merged with another full of people with graduate degrees in computer science, the signs were clear. I didn’t belong there either. I was 28.

And what did I do? I enrolled at McGill, studied economics, completed a master’s degree, and got a position in social policy in the Canadian federal government. I finally had stability and rose to very high levels during a thirty-year career. But that is not belonging, either. In fact, I was often accused of "not wearing the uniform." And they were right, although—ironically—many of my best accomplishments came precisely from not wearing it.

To compensate for the lack of belonging, I became an extremely devoted father. And that worked with my two wonderful daughters. My son, however, decided at age twelve that he wanted nothing to do with me. The girls grew up and, although we still have fabulous relationships, they have their own lives.

As for the two women I married... well, it was better than being alone. And probably, by now, you’re wondering: "What’s wrong with this guy?" I couldn’t say clearly, but years on antidepressants at least took care of the symptoms. I was alone, depressed, but worked incredibly hard and committed myself fully to everything I decided to take on. I was not the sort of man you wanted to mess with.

Since 1995, I had taken the typical winter vacations in Mexico. I loved the country. In 2007 I even took a sabbatical year to live in San Miguel, so when I retired, the natural thing was to move south. And that was when the revelation happened on the highway toward San Miguel.

To be continued

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