Mother’s Day is the 27th anniversary of my column in Rural Roots.
Rural Roots was created by Prince Albert Daily Herald in 1990 and distributed free to homes in North Central Saskatchewan. It’s an area that I know well, having grown up in Tisdale.
I moved to Prince Albert as a bride in 1969 and worked for a year in the lab at Victoria Union Hospital, before returning to classes in Saskatoon to finish a Bachelor of Science degree. I interned at the Prince Albert hospitals and became a Registered Laboratory Technologist. My first job was in the lab at Prince Albert Medical Clinic. In 1975 I left behind my science career to become a stay-at-home parent.
I started work in 1981 at the Daily Herald as the Women’s Editor. I thought it would be for just a year or two, but I ended up working 29 years for the Herald. I moved to being Assistant City Editor, then City Editor and finally Rural Roots Editor in 1997 and began to write this weekly column.
After my husband died in 2006, I became a certified fitness instructor. My first regular class was with seniors at the Heritage Centre. It’s an age group with whom I feel a special kinship.
In 2009, I became the instructor for the Easy Adult Fitness program offered by the City of Prince Albert at the Margo Fournier Centre and later the Alfred Jenkins Field House. Due to arthritic knees and failing eyesight, I retired from working for the City in 2022. However I have continued to lead chair-assisted yoga at Abbeyfield House and Calvary United Church.
In May 2010, when the editorial and composing functions of the Daily Herald were centralized in Moose Jaw, I was laid off along with eight other people. I continued my relationship with readers by writing this column. You can see that the continuous thread through the last 27 years has been writing this column, which I do from home. Writing this column has been a special privilege. With the help of assistive computer technology to compensate for failing eyesight I hope to be able to continue writing this column for years to come.
