Special Olympians warm the softhearted Rickey Burns.
The joy, he says, of spending the past 15 years coaching bowlers and assisting softball teams in preparation for competition is immeasurable.
A bad work day on the heels of Burns carting his banged-up body into a cold hockey rink in the wee hours of a winter morning or swinging a grass trimmer for hours on end during a sweltering summer afternoon can easily melt away in a hug with a Special Olympian at the bowling lanes.
“You get a lot out of it,’’ said the 66-year-old Charlottetown resident of his long run as a volunteer with Special Olympics PEI.
“The one thing is it’s relaxing, it’s enjoyable. You have a ball.’’
Charity Sheehan, program director of Special Olympics PEI, has had the pleasure of witnessing for several years the caring disposition of Burns. She describes him as a genuine and humble volunteer who has immersed himself in the organization.
He is a “go-getter’’ when it comes to fundraising, always playing a role in the five or six annual initiatives aimed at generating money for the Island’s Special Olympians. He coaches the bowlers and he does whatever is asked of him to assist with the softball.
His payback, says Sheehan, comes in sweet and special interaction with the athletes.
“That is kind of the fuel that fires him — what you get back from the athletes is so much more than what you put into it,’’ she said.
“He keeps it on an even keel and he gets to know each athlete individually so it’s not a cookie cutter approach.’’
Burns got involved in Special Olympics as a volunteer when his then 13-year-old son Blair started playing floor hockey with the organization. Burns and his wife Cynthia were jolted when their only son (they have daughters Kimberley Younker and Amanda Knox) took a pair of seizures at age four. Loss of oxygen to the brain proved a major blow to the boy.
“We had to show him what to do...start him all over again,’’ said Burns. “It was nerve wracking.’’
By age 12, Blair was still operating at the level of a four-year-old.
The following year, the couple put their teenaged son into Special Olympics PEI. The organization, Burns believes. has helped his son develop both physically and socially over the years
“He started hanging out with friends around the village,’’ said Burns. “It really opened him up.’’
Blair, now 27, has been enjoying a lengthy run with the organization. Next June, he will be competing as a member of the national softball team at the World Special Olympics in Athens.
Burns, who is affectionately called ‘Wickie’ by many of the athletes who have difficulty rolling out the ‘R’ in Rickey, is hopeful he can make the trip to watch his boy compete at the international level.
Showing Special Olympians how to bowl to the best of their ability — and to the highest level of fun imaginable — was a natural choice for Burns, who was never far from a bowling lane while growing up in the eastern end of Charlottetown.
Burns was only 10 when he started sticking up pins for 50 cents a night at the Charlottetown Bowling Alley that was located where the Confederation Centre of the Arts now stands. He also worked at the Rollaway Lanes on Grafton Street.
Not surprisingly, he rolled his share of games and developed into a good bowler. Twice he competed in the Canadian Five Pin Open. Practicing what he preaches, though, Burns bowls for fun, not to kick butt.
“If I didn’t win, I didn’t win...I didn’t give a darn,’’ he said.
Burns has also been with the Youth Bowling Council of Canada since 1982. He puts in more than 20 Saturdays a year with bowlers ranging in age from four to 19 in an effort to keep the sport vibrant here in the province.
His upbringing could best be termed modest. One of 12 children squeezed into a couple of bedrooms, Burns lived near a coal yard where his family “never stole, just hawked’’ this essential heating fuel of the day.
“It snowed harder inside than outside sometimes,’’ he said in sizing up the shape of his old house.
Son to the late Sally and Jim Burns (his father was a ‘tobacco twister’ at the long-ago Riley’s Tobacco Factory), Rickey Burns dropped out of school at age 16, two years after he started working at Michaels Bros.
Burns first helped with deliveries of everything from fridges to television sets — ‘You name it, they sold it’ — before spending the last dozen years of his 20-year run with the company in charge of shipping and receiving.
“That was good work,’’ he reflected fondly.
After a short stint surveying for the province, Burns found part-time work doing maintenance at the Sherwood Sportsplex (now the Cody Banks Arena).
In 1981, he began work with the community of Sherwood/Parkdale as an icemaker and maintenance person for the soccer and baseball fields.
Amalgamation in 1995, which created a larger Charlottetown when it absorbed Sherwood and Parkdale, resulted in a nice jump in pay of about $6,000 per year for Burns.
Still, the work, including his past 10 years heading grass cutting crews to trim some 60 parks and fields each week in the capital city, have taken a physical toll.
“I have aches and pains,’’ he said. “It kind of gets to you.’’
At 66, the prospect of getting up at 4 a.m. to be in a cold rink by 5:15 a.m. or tackling a night shift from 3 p.m. to 12:45 a.m. at a local arena is not all that appealing.
So Burns is understandably quite upbeat in the knowledge that his last day on the job is just days away.
“They will not get me back there again,’’ he said.
Burns, however, was never one to complain about his job. Nor was he one to cut corners, just grass.
Sue Hendricken, manager of the parks and recreation department with the City of Charlottetown, has been Burns’ boss since 1986. She can’t imagine a better worker.
“He approached all of his work with an absolute vengeance,’’ she said. “With Rickey there was no down time...he doesn’t slow down until the work is done.’’
Hendricken says Burns, who was known as a practical joker who liked to liven things up on the job, had several work place injuries because he was always working so hard and so fast.
“I’m just glad he survived his career and is able to retire a healthy man,’’ she said.
Retirement will allow Burns time to do a little traveling, perhaps take on some part-time work in a less physically demanding job, and to make the avid volunteer even more available to the Special Olympics cause. Burns anticipates a lifetime involvement in Special Olympics for his son. And he certainly has no plans of stepping away from his cherished volunteer roles with the organization.
“I’ll be there until I keel over, I guess,’’ he said.
