Glen Benison

From the Grandstand Glen Benison

As a sports fan, you never know when you are seated in a grandstand, of any kind, just which of those events might unfold in such a way that you are impacted for life. I have been fortunate to have witnessed so many such sporting events that have done just that for me. Read about what I saw from my seats. Sometimes in a packed and noisy Junior B hockey arena, sometimes experiencing the highs and the lows at the Olympic Games, watching a marathon superstar do his thing, being lifted out of my seat at an indoor track meet where I discovered a new hero to embrace, learning a life lesson at my father's side in a wooden grandstand at a men's league fastball game. Read how minor hockey parents can impact the lives of young kids who really just want to have play and have fun and how a stadium peanut vendor got inside my head for decades. And oh, the day we tore the goalposts down. Sometimes the only seat affordable or available was on my parents' livingroom couch with my father sitting beside me. Those, too, brought cherished memories.