'Just Gets Cooler With Age'

On a sunny summer day on Vancouver Island, Andrew Ference surveys his crops.

The former Flames defenceman has carved out a bit of peace and quiet, a bit of solitude on his property in the Cowichan Valley and since retiring from the NHL, he’s tried his luck at growing fresh produce for his family.

Ference left Calgary in 2007 - traded to the Boston Bruins as that franchise assembled a squad that would lift the Stanley Cup four years later - but 18 years on, he’s kept a piece of southern Alberta in his greenhouse.

“I tell a funny story, even in Calgary, I had a worm composting setup,” he explained over the phone from B.C. “I use the composting worms for all my table scraps, I actually still have the same worms.

“Obviously, there's the life cycle (that) has, you know, gone on, but I took them, you know, from Calgary. I took them to Boston. They lived in a fire escape in Boston for those years, and then I took them to Edmonton. And now they're here on the Island, and so I have them out in my greenhouse.”

“So I've always really enjoyed that side of it too, you know, the full life cycle and putting those cuttings and compost back in the soil and taking care of that.

“Then you get to actually enjoy it with the food and stuff that you can grow.”

Ference has stayed connected to the NHL since retiring in 2015-16, though. Employed by the League office, the 46-year-old has found a calling as the NHL’s Director of Youth Strategy, pivoting into that role after a directorial gig in the social impact, growth and legislative affairs sphere.

But he’s using the power of Instagram - giving fans a glimpse into that laid-back, West Coast lifestyle - as both a way to connect, and to educate.

“Some of the stuff I'm working on at work too is, like, trying to get more player marketing and some of the stuff with our current players,” he explained. “Some of my stuff is just an experiment and a bit of an example to give proof of what you can do with social media and how you can connect with fans and really, you know, connect with people through your personal side.”

“I think it’s a good example to our players of the power of connecting with fans beyond, you know, how hard you can shoot a puck or how fast you can skate. I think sometimes people feel a lot more of a connection through, you know, some of those things, and I've definitely experienced that.”

And that’s where the garden comes in.

Amid the fruits and vegetables - and bees, Ference describes himself as a ‘rookie beekeeper’ - he showed off a massive tobacco leaf in one of his recent social media reels.

For Ference, the cultivation of that particular crop has a story, too, one of personal connection and cultural immersion.

“The tobacco actually is a is a neat story because I working with the NHL, we were doing some community events and things like that where we'd end up working with Indigenous communities,” he recalled. “You know, you get some gifts and stuff when you go visit the community, and one time in Nova Scotia, I got a beautiful gift box. It was sage and cedar, sweet grass and tobacco, and it was a little smudge kit. It was really nicely put together.

“And so I actually asked the guy that that put it together for me just to explain it. I said I kinda felt awkward always being on the receiving end. It was it'd be nice to give a gift as well.

“He actually suggested ‘you should try growing tobacco.’ He knew I was gardening and stuff. He suggested I just give it a try and kinda showed me, you know, some different ways to do it.

“So, yeah, I started growing tobacco a couple years ago. I harvest it and dry it and then I just give it as gifts, you know, and work with Indigenous communities and groups. It's just, I think, a really respectful thing to do because it's always such an honour to, you know, go and be welcomed in the community and work with those folks.

“I enjoy growing it. It's a fun plant and fun flower.”

But while Ference’s social media feed is dominated by images of his home life - gardening, cooling off in the river near his home - there was one set of images he posted earlier this year that reconnected him with Flames fans.

On a whim, Ference dropped several galleries of behind-the-scenes stills from Calgary’s memorable 2004 run to the Stanley Cup Final, offering a never-before-seen glimpse into that special spring.

"I had this waterproof Sony camera that I bought, you know, because it was probably the newest thing out there,” Ference explained, adding the impetus for snapping photos came on the heels of a run to the Conference final with the Penguins three years prior. “I'm obviously not knowing, like, how deep we'd go or anything like that, but it was just kind of like ‘I got a camera, why not use it?’ And so I just started snapping pictures that through that run, and a lot of them are just random.

“It's just kinda everyday stuff, which looks a lot cooler when you're twenty years removed, I guess. But it's with all the video games and the style and the stuff we're wearing and how you looked and stuff like that, it just gets cooler with age, I guess.”

“I’m so glad I did that and I probably regret not doing it even more with teams that followed.”

One photo that caught everyone’s eye earlier this year: a snap of Jarome Iginla and Denis Gauthier playing computer games in the team hotel, an activity Ference says took the Flames dressing room by storm back in 2004.

“We got into video gaming a lot, like, we were playing Age of Empires like crazy,” he recalled. “There was a group of us, like, Iggy and Robyn (Regehr). We even visited the game developers down in Dallas and played against the developers.

“Those were some good times, we had a lot of fun with that.”

Today, Ference is happy to spectate.

His two daughters both play high-level sports, and eldest daughter Ava’s rugby career helped spur on the move to the West Coast once Ference’s NHL playing days drew to a close.

“You know, the headquarters of rugby is really out here (with) all the top coaches and stuff,” he said. “So, yes, she ended up coming to high school out on the Island and playing higher level rugby. She's going into her third year at Harvard playing rugby.

“She’s won national championships a couple times, and she plays for Canada at the junior level. She’s really doing well.”

But every now and again, Ference is still happy to lace up his skates.

“None of (my children) played hockey, but I helped coach hockey, and helped with some of the programs at Shawnigan,” he said. “It's a way for me to stay on the ice.

“The high school kids are quickly, outpacing me, but I’ve still got them in fitness. It’s fun.”