by Emil Rem | May 22, 2024 | Analects
Since his retirement several years ago, my client John and I meet every time he’s back in town. His greeting is always the same. “Oh! I have a whole bunch of bills to pay.” “John, they’re all for the trips you make. You have no mortgage. You spend $20,000 a month...
by Emil Rem | May 15, 2024 | Analects
Lou’s best friend once told him “You’re lucky your father was born before you.” Over decades, his family had accumulated a number of rinky-dink 12-suiters across Calgary. In his mid-twenties, with no ambition, Lou became a caretaker of one of those buildings. Lou...
by Emil Rem | Apr 29, 2024 | Analects
Lulu was Flo’s mum. Flo was my English foster mum. Attending North Town Primary School—a fifteen-minute walk from home—I dropped in every Friday afternoon, to visit Lulu from the age of five to eleven. “Tell Flo I’m at the end o’ me tether.” She would say this every...
by Emil Rem | Apr 24, 2024 | Analects
Perhaps it wasn’t my home, but Hong Kong sure felt like it. From the age of twelve, I was showered with free airline tickets by my father, an employee of East African Airways. Although rich in tickets, we were poor financially. This meant sleeping on airport floors...
by Emil Rem | Apr 9, 2024 | Analects
Wes was the most charming client in my menagerie of accounting clients—a great charm causing me the utmost stress and anxiety. Accounting records were not handed over until almost the very last day of the taxman’s deadline. When shown the completed statements and...
