"Ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall, 99 bottles of beer. Take one down, pass it around, 98 bottles of beer on the wall..."
And so it went, all the way until the bottles of beer were gone, the song was finally over and the group of Grade 6 and 7 student singers were laughing with glee. The high school students at the back of the bus were ignoring the singing by the younger kids, as were the chaperone parents.
The bus driver kept his eye on the gravel road for six hours, focused on safely getting everyone safely from Hay River to Fort Simpson for the 1981 N.W.T. school track and field championships, one of the last events of the school year before summer vacation. Later, during high school in the Central Okanagan, there was a band trip to Calgary, a class exchange trip to Quebec and a Grade 12 university tour to Vancouver and Victoria.
Who didn't spend time riding a bus when they were a kid, travelling with other youngsters to another town for some special event?
Whether it's for sports or music or education, the first time most boys and girls in this country and many other countries around the world leave their homes and their families for longer than overnight is on a bus with other young people like them.
We are all Broncos.
The international outpouring of grief and support for the Humboldt Broncos junior hockey team, the players who died and those who survived Friday night's horrible crash, their families and their friends comes from that common experience.
We all rode the bus.
We've all sent our children on the bus.
We are all Broncos.
Those long rides on the bus are some of the greatest childhood and teenage memories many of us have. Songs were sung, games were played, music was listened to, arguments raged, lifelong friendships were cemented, romances were formed and then either explored or crushed, all to a noisy soundtrack of laughter.
It was our first, brief taste of freedom, of adulthood, of having an identity outside of being the son or daughter of our parents.
Riding a bus was important.
Not everybody made the team or the band or was chosen to represent their school or their community. For the first time, we were somebody important on our way to do something important and the bus took us there.
We are all Broncos.
We never gave a thought about not making it to our destination. We were too busy being kids.
As parents, anxious thoughts drift into our minds as we say goodbye but they are crowded out by pride, seeing the joy of our kids as they get on the bus to head off to their adventure. We recall our own journeys from decades earlier and we are thrilled for them. They are growing up and they are having the time of their lives. We drive away a little too happy with the luxurious freedom their sudden absence brings from parenting, but we also can't wait for them to come home, to hear their stories and share in their excitement.
As parents, we imagine the horror of both the biological and billet families of the Humboldt Broncos players and we see only bottomless darkness and pain. For the families of the dead, they will never hold their beautiful son in their arms again, they will never hear his voice, they will never see him play the game he so loved and they will never witness him fulfilling the amazing promise of his life. For the families of the living, the gratitude that their boy lived is buried under overwhelming guilt as they sit at his bedside, helping him cope with physical and emotional injuries that may never heal.
When the team pastor, a few minutes behind the bus in his car, came upon the wreckage and the agonizing sounds from some, and the devastating and permanent stillness of others, he told the community vigil televised nationally Sunday night that he felt, from Psalm 23, that he was walking through the valley of the shadow of death.
For believers, God is still with them and his rod and his staff bring comfort.
For non-believers, the comfort comes from others, from near and far, through words and deeds meant to show we care, that they are not alone in their grief and suffering, that a nation and a world mourns with them, that we are all Broncos.
Through the hurt, the best way we can pay tribute is to get on the bus again, to put our kids on the bus and head down the highway to the next adventure that awaits.
The Prince George Spruce Kings will get on the bus Wednesday for the nearly 1,000 kilometre drive to Wenatchee, Washington, to compete in the team's first-ever Fred Page Cup final for the league championship.
They are our Broncos.
Like the Spruce Kings, the Broncos were competing to earn a berth in the national championship for the RBC Cup. Like the Spruce Kings, the Broncos won 33 times in regulation during the 2017-18 regular season. Like the Spruce Kings, the Broncos were surrounded by a community that doesn't just cheer for their team and wished them well, but loved each person and wanted them all to return safely.
Out of the tragedy in Saskatchewan, hopefully the players, coaches and staff of the Spruce Kings all clearly see that they won't be alone on that bus to Wenatchee.
We are all Spruce Kings.
The team has played so well this playoff spring and is so deserving of a league championship. We must stand next Monday and Tuesday at Rolling Mix Concrete Arena and mourn their dead and injured hockey brothers with them.
That's what those players need from us. Then we must celebrate what the Spruce Kings have accomplished so far and cheer them on to future victory.
The most fitting tribute to the Humboldt Broncos is to keep doing what they were doing, right up until disaster struck Friday night. They were riding the bus, rolling down the highway towards an arena and a big game, laughing together, being kids together and growing up together.
As much as it hurts, let's not stop being Broncos.
-- Editor-in-chief Neil Godbout
