Old Friends

A couple of posts ago, I wrote briefly about the pond that Dad pumped water from to flood the old rink in Titusville, and how we sometimes skated on the pond...as proven by the picture of my brother Jaimie in his snazzy orange pants.  And, one of the lines from my very first blog entry went like this:

When I was a kid, we lived in the country and my father made a rink every year for about a dozen years. My brother and I spent the most time on it, but the only other neighbourhood kids our age - four boys - spent a good chunk of their winters on it too.

Well, an interesting thing happened in the comments section for that recent article.  Actually, two interesting things.

The first interesting thing was that I received comments from two guys about synthetic ice, since I also mentioned synthetic ice in that post.  You can check out more about their products at their websites, for Global Synthetic Ice and IcePro.  Great-looking stuff, but certainly not in the budget for my rink.

The other interesting thing was receiving a comment from one of the "other neighbourhood kids our age," Steve Sabean, who happened onto my blog via my Facebook page.  Steve, his brothers Mike & Mark, and the other neighbourhood kid - Mark Smith - could all tell you about the rink, since they and Jaimie and I basically grew up on that ice.  As Steve said in his comment, "I sure remember all those winter days spent on the Kane hockey rink.  The good ole days."  Thanks for stopping by and saying hello, Steve!

And, since no Backyard Ice blog entry is complete without a picture (OK, actually, there is one blog entry without an illustration of some sort), here you go:

That, my friends, is me on the famous Kane rink in Titusville, showing off in my hockey gear and my favourite team's jersey. This picture is all kinds of awesome, but I'll point out three great things: (1) Snowbanks! (2) Cooperalls!! (3) Hair!!!