The madness continues with Day 2 and 3 of the Labor Day tournament. Thankfully, the schedule gods were kind and I got to see both kids’ games yesterday.
Both the Mayor and Goalielock’s teams played the Ice Bandits from Atlanta. The mayor’s game was earlier in the day. For the majority of the game, it was a close contest. Unfortunately, the Ice Bandits opened up on the 3rd and we lost.
The Mayor worked hard and was more than ready for the team lunch at Sam Sneed’s post game. It’s never easy to feed a team of hockey players and all their families. Yesterday’s lunch took quite awhile, but the food was quite good and the Mayor enjoyed the time with his team.
Goalielock’s and his squad were up next facing the same organization. He’s played with most of these kids since mites and now they’re huge. They look like giants and men. Now longer do they look like the sweet little first and second graders they were when this crazy journey first started.
Their game was pretty good. These boys are coming together quite nicely and will be fun to watch this season. They came away with a strong 4-1 win.
Of course the best part of tournament weekends, is hanging with the crew and barbecuing back at the hotel. The rain put a slight damper on the festivities in that it wrecked most our hair and diluted our drinks. Aside from the rain, the night was pitch perfect. This morning on the other hand was a bit rough.
After driving for what felt like countless hours on the turnpike, we finally made it to the Labor Day Tournament. Well at least hubby and Goalielocks did. Due to a number of accidents, the drive took longer than expected so I dropped them at the rink in Kississimee before heading to Orlando.
I abhor driving in Orlando, but driving in Friday night rush hour in my hubby’s truck takes the cake. Nevertheless, I survived the drive. The Mayor and I made it to RDV in once piece.
Both boys played last night at 6:45 and 7:50 respectively in two different rinks. I was bummed that I had to miss Goalielock’s game. The rink in Kississimee is like a cave. There’s no cell service, so this goalie mom was dying from anticipation in RDV.
Goalielocks and his squad played great. They ended up winning the game 10-0. Always a good night when your goalie gets a shutout.
The Mayor’s squad played a local team that was pretty well padded with travel players. They ended up in a tie, but they had a lot of critical opportunities they were unable to convert. My mayor had a great game getting a hatty and an assist. The Mayor was excited to play last night and is really looking forward to today’s game.
Last night’s loser was definitely Steak N Shake, who saw their entire computer system go down during a storm. By the time we had left, their credit card processing machines still hadn’t come back online.
Finally, the parents were in good form. We kept the bartender in the lobby busy and the bicep curls looked good. Nobody got arrested, broke anything or got sick, so all in all it was a good night.
This time of year is the craziest! We are, at once, back to the crazy break neck pace of school and hockey season. It is time to sync the calendars. If we kept all of our calendars separate, there is no way we’d ever show up to the right place at the right time.
Thank god for Team Snap and the ease with which you can synchronize the team’s schedule to your iCalendar. The downfall, of course, is the constant reminder that we have absolutely no free time until next March. Without the easily synced calendars for the boys activities, we’d be lost.
There is a limit to all of this calendar mayhem. I refuse to integrate my work calendar into my iCalendar. If I did sync it to my phone, I think I would lose my mind! It is all about finding balance in life and that’s where I draw the line. My work calendar has no hockey on it and my personal calendar has no work. I have to keep them separate in order to maintain a healthy work life balance.
We started our morning of 9,000 steps with a ride up to Mt. Floyen on the funicular. Once up the mountain, we hiked around the lake and through the forest. The views of the city, nearby islands and the North Sea were incredible. Thankfully, they had some coffee and cold water in the gift shop for a post hike refreshment.
Post Mt. Floyen, we got on a bus and headed to Mt. Ulricken. We headed up the gondola to see Bergen from the city’s highest peak. Once at the top, we hiked up to the mountain’s peak. The mountain top was home to a farm and several small lakes. The hike was exhausting, but well worth the hard work.
The hardest of part of travelling out of state for hockey tournaments is trying to fit all of the luggage and all of the players into the trunk. It’s a bit of a game as you fight with the hockey bags, maneuver the suitcase and ultimately decided you can live with the sticks in the passenger compartment. Success comes with a true sense of accomplishment once you finally get it all to fit. Once we got the luggage jigsaw puzzle figured out in the trunk, we headed to my parent’s house in the Northern suburbs. The ride home was filled with the boys laughter and excited energy. They were excited to finally make it to our destination, and we were too, but we were exhausted and they were wired.
Michelle vs. the Trunk
Can she do it? Will she do it?
Victory is in hand!
Once at my mom’s house, Michelle and Andrew got acclimated and felt at home – like most people do at my parents- in short order. My mom was ready for us with plenty of fresh cookies to go around. My dad, two weeks post hip surgery, was surprisingly agile and mobile compared to what I had expected. My parents and my niece and nephew were thrilled to see us and our friends. Thankfully my parents were able to help us convince the boys they should take a nap before we headed to the Wild game. They fought taking a nap, but were soon asleep.
After a nice, lengthy nap we got ready and headed down to St. Paul to see the Minnesota Wild take on the Chicago Blackhawks in game 4 of round 2 of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. It was a must win game for the Wild, so the Mayor and I were hoping our squad would show up. While I’ve been to several Wild games in Minnesota and Michelle had been to several Chicago home games, our boys had only been to Florida Panthers games. This was going to be a completely different experience for them.
We got to the game with plenty to spare having hit much less traffic than I had anticipated. Since we had the kids, we couldn’t really pre-game at McGovern’s or Tom Reid’s so we headed into the Excel Energy Center after buying some nice souvenirs. The kids were quick to notice that unlike at the Panther’s games, a lot of the crowd starting to file in was already drunk. Fortunately, neither the Mayor nor Andrew were shy about sharing their observations with others. They were a magnet for trouble and for the second night in a row, Michelle and I were convinced we were going to get shot or beat up on account of their mouths.
The pre-game started and their mouths were agape. The game experience in the Excel Energy Center is second to none as is the energy in the crowd. Having only been to Panthers games previously, the boys’ mouths were agape. They had never seen a building alive with that much energy. For them, the experience was incredible and one they still talk about to this day. As the festivities continued, the fans continued to file in and the boys continued to comment on how they were so drunk they had already spilled beer down the front of their pants.
Unfortunately for the Wild, the most dynamic part of their game was the pre-game and the introductions. They were flat the entirety of the game. The few chances they did have, they did their best to make Crawford look like a god of goal tending. While the Wild’s play was lackluster, the entertainment from the crowd around us was not. A couple comprised of a Wild and a Rangers fan, got into a huge fight and at the behest of the surrounding crowd and his other friends, he ditched her. There was drunk goal to the right of us that managed to fall down two rows barely spilling her beer and not hurting herself.
Perhaps the best moment of the game, was when Andrew started talking smack to the two fans sitting behind him and the Mayor. They were both drinking and one was spitting some chew. Andrew felt compelled to tell him that he was going to call his mother and let her know that her son is a drunk that chews. Thank god they had a sense of humor and thought that the boys were hilarious.
By the skin of our teeth, Michelle and I survived another adventurous night with our crazy boys. The Wild lost and the Blackhawks went on to become Stanley Cup champions that year. Two years later, the Mayor still talks about how incredible it was to be in the Excel Energy Center that night and be a part of the experience. Making new memories and sharing great experiences with my boys, their friends, and my friends is one of the best parts of having our kids participate in a travel sport.
Part 1 and part 2 of the story can be found below:
Two years ago, the Mayor and I headed north with his best friend Andrew and his mom Michelle to a Selects tournament in Minnesota. We were originally slated to go to tournaments in Minneapolis and Boston, but opted out of the Boston trip when the stars aligned and round two of the Stanley Cup put game four of Minnesota vs. Chicago there during our trip. It wasn’t a tough choice.
From the first minute of the trip, I knew it was going to be an epic weekend. We were flying out of PBI on Zachary’s birthday. When we got to the airport to check our bags at the Southwest counter, the customer service rep handed us a $200 in vouchers and a hotel voucher for a luxurious stay in Atlanta. Lucky us! We headed to security where we met up with our friends. As we prepared to go through the queue, the boys felt compelled to ask if Doritos were considered a weapon. Thankfully, TSA had a sense of humor that day.
As we waited to board, we watched in awe as several elderly passengers sat in wheel chairs waiting to get pushed to the baggage area. The airport was not staffed to handle the volume of wheelchairs and they soon grew impatient. No more than five minute had passed before they felt compelled to take matters into their own hands. Soon they all stood and started pushing their chairs. Only in Florida….
Finally boarding zone B was called and we were free to board the plane. Our boys, on their way to their way to their first out of state tournament and their first Stanley Cup playoff game, were bouncing off the walls. At the time, the Mayor had just turned 9 and Andrew was still 8 and only came with one volume level extra loud. We got them calm enough to stand in line to get on the plane.
As we walked down the aisle of the plane to find some window seats for the boys and ourselves, people stopped moving as our fellow passengers put their carry-ons on the overhead. As luck would have it, we were stopped in front of a very attractive, young black woman wearing a white shirt and no bra. Had this site only elicited giggles, it probably would have been okay, but we were not going to get off that lucky. Nope the boys had to announce that they could see her nipples. Oh the shades of red Michelle and I turned as they loudly shared their discovery with us.
We continued filing to the back of the jet, but the boys could not believe what they just saw. They were completely transfixed (pretty much like every other guy I know.) As our flight took off and headed to Atlanta, the boys became distracted by discussions of hockey, jets and life in general. Lucky for us, we would continue to cross paths with the women in the white shirt everywhere we went in the ATL terminal.
There’s hockey mom crazy and then there’s goalie mom crazy. Go to any rink across the US or Canada and you can pick out the goalie mom who is pacing nervously or sitting nervously near the end of the ice. Between periods she’ll migrate from one end of the rink to the other. Depending on how the game’s going for her goalie, she may make small talk with her team’s hockey moms or she may walk by silently.
As her goalie slides across the crease or moves to make a save, she moves with them. When the puck leaves her goalie’s zone, her pulse starts to slow as their team makes their way into the other team’s zone. Her pulse remains steady until the puck pops out into the neutral zone sending her pulse rate up. If the game is close, her pace is safely in the fat burning zone. (Thank you Fitbit!) Not until the handshake line starts, will her nerves start to unwind.
Her job is tough. Her tender could play the game of his or her life, but still walk away with a loss. A loss, which most tenders, will place solely on their own shoulders. On the flipside, her goalie could have an off game and the team could still win.
Goalie is a unique position that takes a unique personality. There aren’t many people, at least sane people, that would volunteer to stand in front of a hard rubber puck moving upwards of 50-70 mph to try and stop it.
As a goalie mom, it is hard to see young goalies, mine included, beat themselves up, but I know the mental difficulties of the position will prepare them to deal with adversity in their lives. For us goalie moms, the Dunkin Donuts coffee, the Ciroc, the Bailey’s, the Goose, the Ketel and our fellow hockey moms help us cope. At least we get an hour of free fat burning courtesy of our goalie’s hockey game!
If you’re looking for more hockey mom related content, here’s the perfect place to start.
Photo Credit for action shots to Pam Huss (awesome FL Bulldogs hockey mom), Pat Cash and myself.
Uniform, jersey, sweater it has many names. It is symbolic of the high level of commitment it took to attain it and symbolic of the club which is represents. There are a number of great quotes involving uniforms about what it means to be an athlete.
Brooks’ quote is legendary and I think most of us remember it from the movie Miracle or from the Lake Placid games. The philosophy of playing harder for your team than for yourself is a key component of hockey culture. It is also a critical component of what made his 1980 team so special. In 1980, the team was comprised of college players mostly from University of Minnesota (Go Gophers!) and Boston University. Just as they do today, my Gophers and Boston University enjoy a healthy rivalry on the ice. In order to get his players to put their egos and these college rivalries aside, he needed to unite them around a common goal and that was playing for the name on the front of their jersey Team USA. Brooks was a genius.
Clemente’s quote speaks to the pride that athletes feel when they put on the sweater. At the professional athlete, I cannot imagine how amazing it must feel. Major League Baseball is the pinnacle of baseball and to make it to that pinnacle after years of hard work must feel otherworldly. The pride he, and his family, must have felt the first time he put on that MLB jersey are something he will probably never forget. I remember the first time my sons’ put on their travel hockey jerseys. The smiles on their face went from ear to ear. You could see the pride the felt in their achievements and they carried their heads a little bit higher.
Lastly, I’ll leave you with my favorite quote on a uniform and it comes from my favorite brassy gal Mae West, who as always said it best and wasn’t wrong.
Tomorrow we will untether the last of your moorings as you graduates high school. I’m still in a state of belief that this day has come, after all, it seems like just yesterday we were bringing you home from the hospital. The point was driven home tonight as I drove to the rink with his younger brothers to watch you play a beer league hockey game. You are now everybody’s favorite player because of your youth and because you can drive dad home post-game.
The process of letting you go and become independent doesn’t start tomorrow at high school graduation; it started way before you even set foot in high school. I remember being struck by this fact when you started preschool. When we dropped you off for your first day, it was tempting to walk in with you and get you situated, but on your grandma’s advice we didn’t. You walked in to class confidently and got yourself squared away. I won’t lie, there was a little pain mixed in with the joy of seeing you gain independence. We parents like to feel needed. This was the first time we as parents had unmoored one of his moorings.
With each passing year, each new stage, trust was gained and with it more independence. More moorings were released. While graduation tomorrow represents the culmination of this journey, even though the moorings are no longer tied to our dock, we will always be here to guide, advise, listen to music with, play hockey with and love you.
