What knits a theatre and its volunteers together?

Retired people have time to give and seek fulfilling activities providing fun and structure. Volunteering is popular in the United Kingdom and an increasingly ageing population potentially provides a pool of willing support. In some cases, volunteers give immense amounts of time, freely. My research asks what knits together a theatre and its volunteers? Taking an ethnographic approach with a modified grounded theory I conducted interviews with a cohort of retired people who volunteer in a theatre, in a market town in rural northern England. I offer visual metaphors regarding how they navigated their transitions from the world of paid work into a third phase of life, how they made meaning for themselves during that journey and the role a theatre plays in that process. In studying these visual metaphors, I propose that what knits together a theatre and its volunteers is buzz, fun and commitment, created through a relationship by which mutual needs are met and fulfilled.