It is that wretched year of our Lord Two Thousand and Nine. Waterloo, Ontario. The land of strip malls, vinyl siding, and concrete. A city without a history or a people. He stands outside the money-printing Research in Motion. A flock of math students walk past, a cloud of nerdery thickly hanging about them. Pimples burst. A cultureless child of a city, he thinks.
Plus, there is only one strip club.
His thoughts turn to Windsor. That blessed City of Roses. From the Casino suites to the village greens of Jackson park. He yearns for the smell of Hiram Walker’s, the rumble and sweat of automotive production, the blue collar fellowship of Ford City to the orange collared Monarchs of Point Pelee. He desires to see the Renaissance Center defiantly puncture the horizon in a decidedly dark age.
“That downtown”, he says to the sons of Waterloo who worship at the Church of Toronto, “was like a hammock – if you were felled by the drink, the city would catch you and give you a place to sleep to boot!” Give him a Blue Jay and he will answer with a Tiger.
This displaced Erie street patron attempted a hockey league. Sure, one or two stragglers from the briny night participated for one or two games, but a project involving camaraderie in a city of isolationism is doomed to fail. The city lacked a spirit. The city lacked an ethos. The city, truly, lacked a Stevo.
* * *
I lived in Waterloo, but I am from Windsor.
Tuesday night on Tecumseh Road. The first shots of the War of 1812 can still be heard, but they sound of a hockey stick hitting Saint Felix’s holy floor. Our region is much more than a Woodward Avenue, a Salt Mine, and, as a President once put it, an “Arsenal of Democracy”. It is the noble and hardworking spirit of an economically forlorn people. It is dedication. It is a sense of stewardship and inheritance of a history rife with innovation and intrigue. It is true grit, love, and fraternity.
I came back to Windsor because I adore this City and its people. The Windsor Tomcats are a unique enterprise – the embodiment of what is admirable in our community. Other cities quite obviously play hockey, but none do so with the class and humour and pureness of spirit as is done here. The Zug Island Hum is a Tomcat growl, calling us back when we stray.
Thank you all. In a not so insignificant way, you make the world a better place.
PS: The strip club in Waterloo is called Roxxxanne’s. She puts out the red light but does not wear that dress tonight.
Windsor Tomcats 