Mathieu
(May 8, 2004)

As you all know, I am not much of a sports fan but when my good friend, Mathieu invited me along to a Toronto Blue Jays baseball game, I could not resist.

Mathieu (pronounce Matt-chew) Manteau and I have been friends ever since his family moved here from Chicoutimi midway through our grade 9 year.  We quickly became friends as both of us sat in the back of Mr. Darby's grade 9 math class, desperately trying to grasp the integer concept.  Unfortunately for me, Mathieu had an excuse as he did not speak much English.

All through high school Mathieu and I were friends.  In fact I was one of the few who hung out with him despite his unpopularity.  The jocks started the teasing, followed by the puckbunnies.  Once the jocks and the puckbunnies start something it's pretty hard to stop it.  Not even all of my goodness and popularity could stop it.  By graduating year, the computer geeks were after him as well.  Apparently having one leg shorter than the other makes you the social retard of high school.  

Poor Mathieu, with his one shorter leg (about an inch) had a rough four years in high school.  The fact that he was French did not help as well.  Of course everyone (even the teachers) brutally englishised his name, so bad in fact that it morphed from Matt Manto to simply Slant-o.

However all was not lost for Mathieu.  Since graduating from high school, Mathieu earned a business degree from the University of Toronto (he did learn his integers after all!), travelled the world (he didn't see all the fuss about the leaning tower of Pisa), became an accountant and bought a house here in Toronto (quite impressive).

His house is particularly interesting as it is in the high-end neighbourhood near the beach (thus called the Beaches).  Normally an entry level accountant could never afford a place in that neighbourhood but the house was cheap due to the foundation sinking on the east end.  A normal owner would have deemed the house 'unliveable' (which is why it was so cheap) but to Mathieu, the slantness of the foundation offsetted his own slantness.  He spends most of his time working on his house and working on his job.  This is why I took him up on his offer to the game.  I hadn't seen him since he bought the house.

We had killer seats at Skydome; first row of the lower deck in the outfield.  There was lots of leg room but it didn't stop us from putting on legs on the facade.

While Mathieu was describing the technique a slanted man uses to hang a picture straight in a slanted house, it happened.  A Baltimore Oriole player hit a long high ball directly at us.  We stood and watched the ball traject towards us.

"I'm going to catch this one!" I boosted.
"No Suzy you're not.  It's going to be short."
"No way!"

With this proclamation, I leaned over the facade and made a spectacular one handed catch.  Unfortunately the momentum of my circus catch caused me to slip over the facade.  Somehow, with my cat like reflexes, I managed to grab the edge of the facade with my right hand.  All my years of eating muffins must have strengthened my right arm because I was able to hold myself up from the 60 foot drop to the pitcher warm up spot below.

I heard the gasp of the crowd as I hung on.  I knew I was on the Jumbotron and wished I did not wear a skirt that day as I could hear the players below whispering.  I heard an usher's voice frantically yelling into her radio.

"Get someone strong up here quick!"

I could feel my grip start to give.  "Curses!  If only I had eaten more muffins in my life, I would be that much stronger.  How can a lack of muffin eating be the end of Suzy TooToo?" I thought to myself.

"Don't worry Suzy.  I've got you."

It was Mathieu - all 5'8, 130 pounds of him.  He reached down grabbed my hand with both of  his hands and pulled.  He slowly leaned back and before I knew it, I was back into my seat.  The usher was stunned.  The crowd was stunned.  The broadcasters were stunned.  But I knew better.  Mathieu had simply used the momentum from his short leg to pull me up.  His left leg is the short one so gravity naturally pulls his body to his left.  It is simple physics if physics can be simple.

I thanked my hero Mathieu as all everybody in the stadium gave him a round of applause.  After, the usher went about her business, the players went about their game and Mathieu and I continued to talk about his new house.  Apparently he thought the flooring was uneven.

Just a typical day in the life of me, Suzy TooToo.