Smitherman - Unconventional Candour: the Life and Times of George Smitherman

Copyright George Smitherman, 2019

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise (except for brief passages for purpose of review), without the prior permission of Dundurn Press. Permission to photocopy should be requested from Access Copyright.

Cover image: Mitchel Raphael
Printer: Webcom, a division of Marquis Printing Inc.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Title: Unconventional candour / George Smitherman.
Names: Smitherman, George, author.
Description: Includes Index.
Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20190051760 | Canadiana (ebook) 20190051779 | ISBN 9781459744653 (softcover) | ISBN 9781459744660 (PDF) | ISBN 9781459744677 (EPUB)
Subjects: LCSH: Smitherman, George. | LCSH: LegislatorsOntarioBiography. | LCSH: Gay legislatorsOntarioBiography. | CSH: Cabinet ministersOntarioBiography | LCSH: OntarioPolitics and government1995-2003. | LCSH: OntarioPolitics and government2003
Classification: LCC FC3078.1.S65 A3 2019 | DDC 971.3/05092dc23

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Nous remercions le Conseil des arts du Canada de son soutien. Lan dernier, le Conseil a investi 153 millions de dollars pour mettre de lart dans la vie des Canadiennes et des Canadiens de tout le pays.

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To Michael and Kayla, who are my reason to live; to Canada, which made me possible; and to all of those who have been told they cant and did anyway.

A memoir always risks being seen as a bit of a vanity project. How could I reasonably expect that my life, starting as a kid in Etobicoke, would ever be book worthy? It was something beyond my wildest dreams.

I have always had an inner conflict in which the self-confident me says, Look what I got to do on a Grade 12 diploma, and the insecure me asks, How could I warrant a book?

I have watched others, people with lives certainly as interesting as mine, who have never managed to produce a memoir, often due to their own reticence or to their loyalty to those who might otherwise make the best fodder for their stories.

As you will see in my book, I have no reticence. And without it, I myself make the best fodder. Thats deliberate, because I want the book to help, and to help it has to be candid and expose some real truths about power: how to get it, how to use it, and how to walk away from it. The book also reveals some real truths about my own character and peculiar brain chemistry, and I am prepared to be judged for my complete body of work.

For every salacious, heart-wrenching, or embarrassing anecdote you might encounter in this book that leaves you asking how I can live with myself, please dont ever forget that I choose to take my lumps and press forward despite the strong urge to toss in the towel, because I have experienced enough joy and hope to withstand and offset any downside.

I want this book to be a message to those people who feel that the circles of power are impenetrable: you can penetrate them.

I want this book to be a message to those people who struggle with addiction and cant see the other side: you can get to a place where despair does not have to be your constant companion.

I want this book to be a message to those people who have been struck by trauma once or one too many times: you are stronger than you know and the resilience you show now will hold you in good stead for the rest of your life.

This is the story of an unremarkable kid who, when asked at age six what he wanted to be when he grew up, said, Blood donor. And who, thirty-three years later, as minister of health, was forbidden from giving blood because of his sexual orientation.

This is the story of a man who rose to the heights of power and risked it all.

This is the story of a man who loved and lost and loved again.

This is the story of a man who dreamed of having kids and had them.

This is a fairy tale without the candy coating.

But it is a personal journey interwoven with our politics, which have evolved over the four decades since I wandered into the Liberal party in Etobicoke Centre. During that time, I have served as a Liberal volunteer, a party staff member, an opposition MPP, a cabinet minister, and a candidate in two municipal elections, and I have seen an almost unbelievable change in how politics is practised. The friendly rivalry that characterized my early exposure to politics in the era of Bill Davis and David Peterson has deteriorated into a bitter partisanship that increasingly bypasses spin in favour of outright nonsense.

Back in the 1980s, it wouldnt have been that hard to imagine Peterson or Davis sitting at each others cabinet table. Today, the disdain between Premier Doug Ford and his predecessor, Kathleen Wynne, is palpable, even in the legislative chamber.

Terrible as this transformation is, the fact remains that politics is a central part of our democracy. I have been privileged to participate in a significant way in the political process in Ontario and in Toronto. My book tells the story of our political evolution and my part in it, as well as that of my own personal evolution.

I played golf on October 3, 2003. The night before, the Liberal Party had won the Ontario election and returned to power after a thirteen-year absence, and I had held my seat (Toronto CentreRosedale) in the Legislature. I remember it was a cold autumn day and I smoked a celebratory cigar during the round. Although Im naturally competitive, the game didnt matter. It was a way to relax. Besides, the bigger game had already been won. And I was expecting things to get better still. I was confident that premier-elect Dalton McGuinty would put me in his cabinet. I didnt feel I had to lobby people in his inner circle for a seat at the table. They knew who I was.