dropping the puck

dropping the puck
Originally uploaded by Rob Hoey

Since coming to Canada in July of 2010, I have attended 300 percent more hockey games than I ever had before in my life. This is how I'm going to remember this wonderful year. A time when hockey became what I do--well, actually, what I watch other people do. I imagine it must be exhausting to skate like your life depended upon it for an hour, with a couple of breaks in between. I went to see these kids play because I was hired to do a photo shoot for a team from the USA. It's all so confusing--when I lived in the Big Apple, I went to one NY Ranger game in my entire career as a man. It was long before anything much was going on--Osama bin Laden was just a little kid with big dreams of killing people, and the Rangers were actually a decent hockey team, they say. The thing I did not enjoy about the game at Madison Square Garden was the beer. Not in the drinking of it, but in the wearing of it whenever the Rangers scored a goal, or whenever the other team made them look like a bunch of schoolgirls in plaid skirts. I don't remember which. But I decided hockey wasn't for me--not in the watching or the playing.

But then I became a wannabe Canuck and I already went to a Sens game, which they lost. The confusing part was who to root for because they played my beloved (Ha) Rangers. Then I saw these great kids, all with guts and determination, grit, and skate savvy work their little hearts out to play the game they all loved and all lost. I am now a sorta Canuck, but I felt that I had to root for the Jaguars from the USA. Both games went to the other teams and it saddened me. In the first game they played well, they really did, but the other team was, how do you say, better. I took about 300 photos of game 1 for posterity and I believe the dad who enlisted my services, likes them. In the second game, the Jaguars were playing better than the other team, but somehow those little maggots from the other team tied the score in the 3rd period at 2 - 2. (I am totally kidding--they were also wonderful kids). So what does the coach of my Jaguars do? He pulls the goalie with abooot 3 minutes to go. Eh. And then what da ya know, eh, the maggots score an open net goal. So what does the coach do, eh? He keeps the goalie pulled. Then there is a humongously loud Honk! Times runs out as I slightly pee myself from the noise of the freaking horn. Game over. Trophies are handed out to the top players on each team, but I am probably more disappointed in the two losses than the kids, who are just glad to see some snow around the holidays. Go figure sportsmanship, eh.

Well, maybe next year.