By Bromley Chamberlain
Paul Brandt has pretty much summed up my last few weeks in one refrain: “This piece of heaven, I have found. Rocky mountains and black fertile ground, everything I need beneath that big blue sky. I’m Alberta bound.”
I am Bromley Chamberlain, and up until a week ago, I’d never been further west than Sudbury, Ont. Needless to say, I’m new to Rimbey; I’m new to Alberta.
For months I have been telling people, “I want an adventure, I want to do something, go somewhere,” Being a fresh-out-of-school college graduate, all I was hoping for was a full-time job — any job, but in a perfect world, a job in my field: photojournalism. I avoided applying to large city dailies because I was set on community news, which is close to my heart as a small-town girl. The Rimbey Review sounded like my kind of paper. When I had applied for the position I thought it sounded perfect. Of all the jobs I applied for, I wanted to work in Rimbey.
So when George Brown, the editor of the Review, offered me the full-time reporter’s job, it felt like a dream come true.
Except that I had approximately two weeks to pack up my life in Ontario, quit my job at a pizza place, and “put my affairs in order,” so to speak. I packed my little car and started my journey west. “And so I cranked up the radio, Cause there's just a little more to go, for I'd cross the border at that Sweet Grass sign, I'm Alberta Bound.”
My dad was making the trip with me: he’s the expert after all. He worked at Lake Louise for five summers in his Twenties. For him, it was a trip back in time; for me, a wonderful adventure.
I thought I would be bored during the drive out. I thought I’d need books to read, movies to watch, but I ended up watching the scenery pass by. We saw the Big Nickel, Lake Superior, the Goose in Wawa. We saw Gitchee Goomee, Winnie the Pooh, forest after forest after forest; the poignant Terry Fox memorial in Thunder Bay, Kakabeka Falls, Max the Moose in Dryden; we saw Indian Head, the Home of Little Mosque on the Prairie TV series, flat fields of Saskatchewan, Lake Louise’s vibrant blue, my first sight of mountains, and then Rimbey.
I have only been in Rimbey for a few short days and I am looking forward to meeting everyone. So far, everyone has been incredibly kind and welcoming. The town is beautiful and the scenery reminds me a lot of my home in Muskoka, Ont. I was born and raised a small-town girl and am very eager to become a part of this one.
I’m your new newspaper go-to gal. If you have an event you would like to see in the paper, a story you think is great, a photo-op, or just want to say hi, please don’t hesitate to give me a call, or swing by the office. I can’t wait to meet you!