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The old schoolhouse was only a few miles from where my parents farm near the foot of Turtle Mountain in southwestern Manitoba.
Years of abandonment had taken their toll on the building. The decay was evident from the road. I never drove in to see just how bad things were inside.
It saddened me to see this former one-room school slowly ebbing toward collapse. Some of my best and earliest childhood memories were formed there during summer picnics and community dances that continued to be held, even for a time after it had ceased being a school.
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I remember a bench along the back wall, where younger kids would get lulled to sleep by the sound of fiddles and feet shuffling across the hardwood floor as the evening wore on at community dances.
They were happy times.
Everyone visited and there always seemed to be laughter among the parents. Gunnysack races, three-legged races and ball games were part of the fun at the picnics.
A couple of years ago, I drove by for another glimpse of this building that held such fond memories, but it was gone.
I thought maybe it had fallen to the relentless wear and tear of the elements, or that someone had torn it down for salvage or moved it away for a garage.
A sense of loss passed through me.
More recently, I was at Windy Willows, a restaurant started by the farm family of Aggie and Glen Buhler northwest of Boissevain, Man. I had heard good reports about their ambitious endeavours and thought it might warrant a story. (See page 67 in this issue about the Buhler’s venture into agri-tourism.)
Soon after sitting down in the restaurant with Aggie, the conversation turned to the topic of how their restaurant came about.
It turned out the restaurant was the school I so fondly remembered from the tiny community of Whitewater, named after the lake that stretches between Boissevain and Deloraine.
I couldn’t believe it. The building had not only avoided demolition but had been restored into a cozy, charming restaurant.
Wedding, anniversary and birthday celebrations are among the functions the Buhlers hold there.
I couldn’t help asking what had become of the bench that I remembered falling asleep on so many years ago.
It was still there, in a room added onto the school when it was converted to the restaurant.
It was heartwarming to know that a part of the past had been given a future.
