I’ve experienced my share of memorable parties over the decades, but the mega-celebration at the hockey arena in Honeywood on Feb. 16 quite possibly takes the cake.

The cause for celebration was the Highland Companies recent withdrawal of its controversial plan to turn thousands of acres of prime farmland (home to Honeywood Loam) into a massive limestone quarry. Essentially, corporations with very deep pockets wanted to dig a very deep hole to fill their shareholders’ equally deep pockets.

One of the organizers (tongue in cheek) thanked the Highland Companies for bringing together so many diverse groups and individuals who otherwise would not have met. Paradoxically, a big-city American hedge fund accidentally built a stronger community in rural Canada and energized an ongoing Food and Water First movement.

The capacity crowd at the party was a reflection of that diversity and that sense of community. Partying together were transplanted urbanites, longtime ruralites, holdout farmers who wouldn’t sell to Highlands, farmers who sold and regretted it, babes-in-arms, local elders, ranchers and Native people; plus representatives from the Council of Canadians, the David Suzuki Foundation, Wellington Water Watchers and journalists and musicians who were not even trying to appear objective.

And this diversity was also reflected in the music, the dancing and the food. In the music department there was everything from square dance reels, to native drumming, to a fresh-faced band called Harlan Pepper playing songs easily three times their age, to Our Lady Peace and a young vocalist named Kirt Godwin who was apparently channelling John Lennon.

Young solo freestylers shared the dance floor with jiving intergenerational unlikely partners and elderly couples waltzing with the kind of synchronization that only comes from decades of dancing together. When a traditional country square dance was followed by a traditional native round dance, the symbolism seemed perfect, with the circular non-linear nature of native cultures juxtaposed with the grid roads and square fields laid out by settlers.

With the local food movement playing such a key role in this struggle, it wasn’t surprising that there was some great food on offer.

Choices ranged from gourmet golden caviar hors-d’œuvres to egg salad sandwiches, both of which I enjoyed equally, with a slight preference (partially sentimental) to the homemade sandwiches set out by the local women around midnight.

As you’d expect, there were speeches and many people to be thanked and lots of applause and cheering. Local rancher and North Dufferin agricultural and community task force chair Carl Cosak delivered the keynote address, dressed in his signature pink cowboy shirt, cowboy hat and oversized belt buckle. One of the more moving moments came when a young teenager, speaking on behalf of the next generation, presented him with a new belt buckle customized with the task force’s logo.

Cosak spoke with great passion about how this battle had surpassed political partisanship, with support from within all three parties, including Red Tory Wellington-Halton Hills MP Mike Chong.

Cosak, ever the showman, got the crowd going by reminding them: “We said we’d send the PR firm back to New York and the hedge fund back to Boston and we did it!”

Native elder Patricia Watts recounted, in reverential terms, traversing the proposed quarry site with Cosak on horseback — a new take on the stereotypical cowboy and Indian scenario — she having never been on a horse and he, having never met native people, expressing his new-found respect for First Nations culture and sensibilities. Watts also drew a parallel to the Idle No More movement, recognizing the importance of not succumbing to colonialism’s classic divide and rule tactic.

University of Guelph agriculturalist and quintessential farm boy Rene Van Acker managed to captivate the crowd (despite the fact that many were in a party mood) with a lecture-style talk about the importance of soil, water, genetic diversity and farm viability. This was a crowd ready to listen before they partied.

Several speakers reminded the receptive audience that victory is a relative term and encouraged them to remain engaged through the task force’s new focus on food and water first, to be vigilant regarding possible next moves by Highlands, lobby to amend the aggregate resources act to fill legislative loop holes you could drive a gravel truck through.

Perhaps my favourite moment was during the party when someone announced that the seventh generation of a holdout farm family was in the room, at which point a baby was held high in the air above the crowd and an audible gasp went through the crowd — perhaps in response to the sheer confidence of a young first-time father hoisting a newborn into the air, but also, I think, in recognition that this was a historic watershed moment and that victories like this are few and far between and need to be savoured and celebrated.

By Dale Hamilton

Dale Hamilton is a member of the Guelph Mercury Community Editorial Board and Playwright for Everybody's Theatre Company

Published in the "Guelph Mercury", Feb. 26, 2013