Would you like some Hamilton with your Tim Hortons?

"Good morning, my name is Amanda, thank you for choosing our Tim Hortons location, how may I help you?"  This is my second alarm clock that faithfully goes off at 8 am every Monday morning as I place my order.   I am a weekly Tim Hortons drive-thru aficionado.  (It is easy to do when you have 4 Timmy's locations within 4 blocks from your front door.) I have practiced the art of devouring sour cream glazed donuts since the tender age of 15, when I became an employee of the franchise (which lasted about 3 months.)  That was in 1998, and Tim Hortons has become even more of a Canadian cultural fix in the past 12 years extending beyond the borders of Hamilton to such places as Kandahar, Afghanistan.
Hamilton, giving birth to the first Tim Hortons location, has been defined by this cultural icon.  Within Canada, there are some who describe it as part of the essential Canadian Story.  Pierre Burton suggests, "It is a story of success and tragedy, of big dreams and small towns, of old-fashioned values and tough-fisted business, of hard work and of hockey."  Others, such as Rudyard Griffiths believe, "Surely Canada can come up with a better moniker than the Timbit Nation."
How has Tim Hortons defined you?  How have you defined Tim Hortons?  For some it is the only way to start a day, for others it is a meeting place, where everything from sports to family to business can be discussed.  For others, it is a point of tension based on the methods of coffee bean production, which is part of the Sustainable Coffee Program. Reguardless of what Tim Hortons represents to the individual, I have a hard time imagining Hamilton without Tim Hortons, and an even harder time imagining Tim Hortons without Hamilton.  Here's to being 'Always Fresh', Always Tim Hortons and Always Hamilton.