Every four years, coinciding with the Winter Olympics, people in the U.S. become interested in the sport of curling.
This year, far from Italy, in a small Massachusetts town, a curling club and its graying membership are hoping to capitalize on the moment.
On a frigid February night, another match is about to begin at the Petersham Curling Rink.
Club members are playing each other, putting their water and beers down on a window ledge before the first 40 pound stone is curled.
"Good curling," someone starts. "Good curling, good curling," others chime in.
Off the ice, long time club member Ted Paul is watching the players through a giant window in the warm room, as it's called.
"What they want to do is they want to come down and they want to put a guard up to protect that rock in the back," he explained.
Th warm room is a big enough space for people to see matches unobstructed — and hang out.
There’s an often used kitchen, some old couches and a bar, and still room for the club’s many trophies and memorabilia.
Curling for life
"Oh! nice shot," Paul said as he kept his eyes on the players, but also enjoyed plenty of banter with others watching.
A cow bell is rung; typically that's to note a great curl, and tonight it's also rung to stop action and honor Paul for his years of service to this tiny club.
He has been curling his entire life. His parents curled here, almost from when the Petersham rink first opened in 1960.
Paul is retiring from the heating and cooling business, at 72 years of age. He's heading to Florida, where he acknowledges, there is not too much curling.
“ I'm not giving up curling," Paul told his fellow curlers standing in the warm room. "It's just that I'm not going to be in a place where I'll be able to curl full time.”
Paul has been through good times and bad with the Petersham club. He was here when members couldn’t pay the electric bill he told the others, until they won $5,000 a match.
"But you people have made the good times far better than I could ever have imagined," Paul said, thanking them.
Bringing this moment together is curler Moe Lewis Wolf.
"Ted has mentored many of us," she said. He did the ice for a million years. He was our treasurer. Ted was like the bricks in the building."
The importance of good ice, and needing more people to learn
Wolf started curling 12 years ago, sort of on a dare she said. The retired nurse spends a lot of time at the rink for the sport and stays for the camaraderie.
She happens to also have a fascination with how ice for curling is prepared, pebbled and shaved — and she says only a few people know how to do it right.
"If you just had flat ice and you took one of our curling stones and tried to throw it, it would be like shoving a dead body on the ice," she said.
Wolf, on the board of the curling club, is paying a lot of attention to how their members are aging out of the game.
The Winter Olympics are a chance to lure young people into the sport.
This month and March, Petersham is hosting a new member-old member potluck and several learn-to-curl-nights.
"We have a skills and drills day to come and get coaching if you want to tweak your delivery, if you want to talk about sweeping, if you want to learn about being a skip or a vice skip," Wolf explained.
It takes a lot of people to run a curling rink she said, paying annual dues and helping out.
"This is the challenge of any of the long standing clubs. It's trying to find members who are young enough that want a curl, and getting them so that they can be part of your vast volunteer squad," Wolf said.
This particular sport is not everyone’s thing.
Some here said their spouses would rather watch a battery charge than walk back and forth across a sheet of ice and curl.
But there’s something about this game; it can be the most frustrating thing in your life, Wolf said, and also the very best.
Watching the Olympics
As for this year's Olympics, Wolf said of course she's "screaming USA at the TV."
But, she also favors the Canadian women's teams.
"Do I want them to win? Yeah, I really want them to win, but if they blow it, one of the best parts about curling is watching people do shots and you're like, oh my God, look at that," she said.
Curlers have a big appreciation for anyone who's playing the game, Wolf said.
"I don't think there's a curler in here who wouldn't be screaming with joy for a Norwegian team that managed to steal something from another team," Wolf said, "because they out curled them, you know?"
