I grew up watching curling with my Dad. It’s no wonder that I still love to watch it! Being from Newfoundland and Labrador, we never had a team go so far as what Team Gushue did. I still remember them winning gold at the Olympics back in 2006 and that was it, Gushue has been my team since! My love for curling got my husband hooked on watching it. He grew to love it as well! Whenever curling events came to and near Ottawa, we would attend. The Brier in Ottawa in 2016, the Brier in Kingston 2020, Olympic Trails, the Men’s Worlds, even went to Cornwall for the Shirty Jenkins and got to meet Team Gushe and g9t my jersey autographed! That was a bucket list item crossed off my list for sure! I o wanted to go to St John’s in 2017 for the Brier, but was due with our 2nd daughter and was unable to travel. I wish I could have been there. But a story we tell everyone and even Brad Gushue himself, is that Gushue was my husband’s last handshake in March 2020 before the world “ended”. We bought tickets to the final in Kingston and just kept praying that Gushue would make it. We left for the drive on Sunday afternoon during the game that would decide if they would go to the finals or not. I had my family text updates on the way. We arrived in Kingston as the game ended and I just knew that Gushue was going to the finals! We checked into our hotel, put on our gear and headed to the patch before the final game. The crowd and atmosphere was nothing like I had ever experienced, it was electrifying! The game was amazing and Gushue won! It was so unreal, I just couldn’t believe that I just witnessed them winning! We stayed and hung around while they talked to fans and Brad made it over to us. Andrew, my husband, shook his hand and congratulated him on winning and asked “Where was the party at?”. Gushue responded that he didn’t know but was headed out to celebrate. We tried to find them after the game with no luck, but that didn’t damper our moods. A week later, the world completely shut down due to Covid and things have never been the same. Andrew still talks about that game and we even told Brad about it when we met him in Cornwall, The Last Hand Shake. We were in Florida when they announced the Brier in 2026 in St John’s and we’ve already decided that we are going and are planning on buying the opening weekend package to see some great curling.
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