*Me on my armchair earlier this month: “Go Team Red! Go!” 

As I sit by the fireplace on this blustery, blowing snowy day, I am watching our oldest granddaughter from Calgary playing for gold in a ringette tournament in Richmond. Now, it may not be exactly like I am sitting in the cold rink but I am there in spirit and cheering from my armchair. With our family spread out across the country, I would envy all the grandparents enjoying their grandchildren. Our visits seemed to be too few and far between and I felt like we were missing so much. Our oldest grandchild is thirteen, our middle grandson is ten and our youngest is now four. And in a span of thirteen years, technology just keeps on advancing. Even in that time frame I have noticed the change.

Just the other day at coffee break, a couple of us mature staff started reminiscing about this very thing. Now I am really going to date myself when I say that when I was taking my secretarial course I started off on a manual typewriter and in the second semester I was given an electrical one. I remember struggling with the speed of the touch just to keep my mistakes in check. We were all sharing stories from watching Neil Armstrong walk on the moon, Fred Davis and Pierre Burton on FrontPage Challenge to finishing our Sunday night with Bonanza. And we all came to the same conclusion that even with all the channels available nowadays, there still isn’t anything to watch on some evenings.

Who would of thought that a device that once filled the size of a room now fits in the palm of our hand!

Fast forward a couple of weeks and once again our weekend consisted of watching our oldest grand daughter playing in a ringette tournament in Edmonton thanks to live streaming on our iPhone. We were telling our oldest daughter that, thanks to one of the team’s ringette dads, all the parents and grandparents who can’t be there are still able to be there cheering from the background. And as Kevin said... “another silver to add to the collection.” Within minutes of the game ending I sent a quick message of congratulations to her and when she was able, Missa phoned us back. Later that afternoon we had a play date with the youngest granddaughter in northern BC via FaceTime. That evening our middle daughter who is in Jamaica, with smiles for miles, gave us a quick update on how everything was going and let us know when she would be returning to Vancouver.

So, as I sit here in my pyjamas on ‘Family Day’ determined to have one of those days where you do as little as possible, I said to Orest, “the worst thing that could happen to us today is, with all the snow and cold weather, that the internet goes down.”