This copy is for your personal non-commercial use only. To order presentation-ready copies of Toronto Star content for distribution to colleagues, clients or customers, or inquire about permissions/licensing, please go to: www.TorontoStarReprints.com

Listen here or subscribe at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favourite podcasts, including YouTube, where Closed Captioning is available. Stay updated on episodes via our Twitter page. If you would like to support the journalism of the Toronto Star, you can subscribe at thestar.com/subscribingmatters.

Today, we are taking you to Novoiavorivsk, a small town outside Lviv, Ukraine near the Polish border. Reporter Johanna Chisholm spent time there over the weekend, speaking with the townspeople on the different ways this war is both tearing them apart and banding them together; the ways in which they attempt to help each other and search inward for personal resolve. People who would ordinarily find themselves clocking in for work are now part of a well-oiled machine sewing balaclavas, watching check points or helping out in any big or small way they can. There's a war raging, and they are finding ways to contribute if they can’t be one of the thousands who can pick up arms. Here we bring you the stories from a town on the edge of war and the people who have come together to stand on guard.

This episode was produced by Johanna Chisholm, Julia De Laurentiis Johnston, Matthew Hearn and Sean Pattendon.

Copyright owned or licensed by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or distribution of this content is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Toronto Star Newspapers Limited and/or its licensors. To order copies of Toronto Star articles, please go to: www.TorontoStarReprints.com