The Rural Way

Thumbing through the history book ‘A Tapestry of Time’ recently caused me to reflect on the circle of life and how I am now old enough to recognize certain cycles. The historic article that gave me pause was an account of how Spiritwood’s Centennial Arena was built and some of the fundraising toward the cost – this is the arena that we are now replacing with the new yet-to-be-named hockey and skating rink.

The most notable common factor between the 1967 version and the new arena (because it would not be fair to compare years to completion or cost) is that both facilities were only attainable with a great deal of volunteer labor. To leave every task to the paid general contractor and his crew would result in not only a prohibitive price tag but also an extended timeline during which two facilities would need to run con-currently because of a lengthy completion date.

A second strong and very obvious link between the old and new projects is the amount of money the citizens of the area have solicited through fundraising efforts. Indeed, many of the major contributors to the project of ’67 will doubtlessly have contributed to the project we will see at tomorrow’s first hockey game!

I stood inside our bright, beautiful new rink today in what I intended to be a visual evaluation, a construction update as I have done recently…and from the upstairs lounge area looking out at the gleaming ice and shiny boards, I was overcome with a profound sense of pride. This is the basic principle of the rural way of life – we did it together!