The Butterfly Effect – Jean McKay

We’re less than a week away from Comic-Con, and some sad news hit me today and made me think of a classic sci-fi theme – The Butterfly Effect.  I’m not talking about the Ashton Kutcher movies, but the concept of cause and effect explored in the movie.

As defined by WiseGeek, The Butterfly Effect is a term used in chaos theory to describe how small changes to a seemingly unrelated thing or condition (also known as an initial condition) can affect large, complex systems.

If you’re a Trekker, you know this concept in every episode when the crew of the Enterprise went back in time to ‘fix’ events.  Other people call this “alternate realities” – that they are infinite numbers of existence – a world where Germany won WW2, or a life where you decided to marry someone else, or you decided to take a left turn instead of a right.  Think about the FINAL DESTINATION movies and think, what if?  What if?

Some butterflies have more powerful effects on your life.  Maybe a different choice of cereal in the morning won’t change world history, but maybe if you went to a different school, a different college, if your parents hadn’t divorced, who knows how your life might have changed.

One great butterfly of change in my life was my high school English teacher, Mrs. Jean McKay, at Westdale Secondary in Hamilton, Ontario.  I’ve heard everyone has a special teacher or mentor who impacts your life, and mine was definitely Mrs. McKay.  She was my teacher for 3 years and she provided the blessing and drive for me to follow my dreams and love of writing.  She and her husband, Dr. Alexander McKay, encouraged me to move to Los Angeles when Christian asked me to relocate to work on his career.

It’s hard to describe her.  She personified elegance and class. A genteel reality from another era and civilization.  Her dinner parties were my first exposure to culture.  At any particular dinner, you could be seated beside a diplomat, a famous opera singer, or a government minister.  The McKays lived in a beautiful old mansion which Dr. McKay himself described as patrician.  The house had 2 baby grand pianos where guests could play duets, and her guests snacked on homemade candied almonds served in real 2,000 year old Roman bowls.  Dr. McKay was a professor of Classics, specializing in Roman history, you see.  Mrs. McKay happened to have been a trained opera singer before she became a teacher.

Before Downton Abbey, I had the McKays.  Mrs. McKay and her husband were fond of me and kept in touch after I graduated from high school.  When I moved to L.A., Mrs. McKay would tell me about any interesting books she thought would make great movies, and she told me about CAPTAIN CORELLI’S MANDOLIN which she thought would have been perfect for Christian.  Of course, we all were hoping for Christian to land the lead of Corelli, but the book ended up being optioned by Nicolas Cage’s production company instead.  Fortunately, because we were tracking the book so early on, Christian stayed involved with the project and landed the part of Mandras, the Greek fisherman.  One of my proudest moments was to invite Dr. and Mrs. McKay to the Toronto premiere of CAPTAIN CORELLI as both mine and Christian’s guests.

Today, I found out that Mrs. McKay had passed away, and I’ve been thinking in a cloud back to her wonderful dinner parties which were as exquisite to the senses as a Merchant Ivory film. It was easy to be dazzled and intimidated by the place settings, impressed by the sumptuous Italian food, the elegant mansion on Turner Avenue, her letters of encouragement and cheer, and her beautiful Christmas cards which featured Renaissance paintings.

I knew she was ailing these past couple years but I was happy that I managed to send her a copy of my book a month ago.  She is in the Acknowledgements as she should be.

Requiescat in pace, my teacher.