Pickle Barrel
IT’S PRECISELY 8 A.M. on a Thursday morning when I walk into Ken Alexander’s Riverdale home, struck by the normalcy of it all.
Coffee is poured and passed, juice topped up, toast buttered. Daughter is perched upon a stool, munching on cereal while son shuffles with iPod, assuring parents that he’s prepared for his math test. Alexander and his wife Sharyn — a family lawyer — are juggling the same getting-the-kids-ready-forschool- before-work routine as millions of others.
This is not what I expected when I entered the home of the man behind what is arguably the country’s most successful magazine. Because while most humans are just easing into their days after a good night’s rest, Alexander began his day just as he usually does — at 3 a.m. He had already been to his downtown office, edited a 9,000-word piece and returned home in time to see the kids off to school.
Knowing this routine, I had expected to encounter a more haggard, barely coherent version of Alexander, perhaps chugging coffee straight from the pot, when I walk into the kitchen where breakfast is underway.
It strikes me, while shaking his hand, that someone as genetically gifted as Alexander would more likely be splashed upon a magazine cover than the brainpower behind it. Sure, there’s a hint of fatigue around his eyes — probably from having spent the past six hours reading — but not nearly as much as I had expected from a man who only sleeps about three hours per night, taking advantage of the quiet early hours to edit, uninterrupted.
Dressed casually but smartly in a white-collared shirt and black pants, Alexander seems relaxed hovering around his kitchen island. Watching him sip his coffee, munch on his typical breakfast — two slices of toast — and make conversation with his family, it’s seems hard to believe that this was the Alexander I’ve heard so much about. This was the man whose mission to create a general-interest magazine in Canada that could compete with the likes of The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly and Harper’s Magazine is often equated to insanity by his critics; who not only goes against the grain but invests $2 million of his inheritance to do it; who fires himself as publisher and declares himself editor; and who works 16-hour days and calls it “fun.” This is not exactly what most would classify as normal.
I detect a hint of regret when Alexander motions that it’s time to say goodbye to his wife and kids and catch his usual Broadview streetcar. “I’d like to spend more time with them,” he says, between puffs of his cigarette — he admits his smoking has increased significantly since the fall of 2003. But, in his radio-show baritone voice, Alexander explains that his hectic, sleep-deprived routine is the only way he can juggle launching a magazine and spending some time with his family.
“When you haven’t reached where you need to be, you’re always working,” he says. “That’s the nature of the beast.”
But at least he is not without a sense of humour. “Our house is the only one in Riverdale going down in value,” he jokes.
The streetcar is packed, and we find standing room. He pulls out his latest issue, turning the pages as delicately as one would handle a most treasured possession. It’s come a long way, he explains.
“Everyone told me that we would fail,” he says. “And, in the beginning, we did everything wrong.”
We exit the streetcar and embark on a long, disorienting walk along his regular route — the only exercise he says that he gets these days. No matter how crowded it gets in the underground PATH, Alexander pauses to hold the door open for others — every time.
We arrive at the Duncan Street building at 9 a.m. I notice that The Walrus occupies the same floor as a cranial therapy office. The joke is lost on no one.
Alexander explains that we’re the first ones here because the crew had been working late the night before to meet deadlines. I notice that his tiny, dark office seems to have accumulated a lot of clutter despite his claim that he’s never in there. “And this is clean,” he says.
He prefers his unofficial office — a larger brighter room featuring a long table. Award-winning writer Don Gillmor soon arrives to go over his edited piece. Being in the presence of such high-calibre writers is normal at The Walrus.
It’s impressive enough that Gillmor found 9,000 insightful words to say about the Liberal leadership convention, but Alexander is giving him a run for his money, judging by the amount red ink. I brace myself for dramatic editor-writer combat but, instead, am shocked by calm, intelligent, respectful discussion.
Once staff trickles in, Alexander gets called upon constantly: first, advice on artwork then where to place a story. And the cover image still needs to be selected. It’s the last day before pages go to print, but he never loses his cool. He does, however, need another smoke.
By the time I leave, I feel that, instead of meeting the man behind The Walrus, I’ve met the walrus himself. Nobody could survive what it takes to launch a magazine — especially after an icy reception — without flexibility and a thick skin.
Tusks wouldn’t hurt either.
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