Puddles of light

I was driving home from the rink late tonight and had what I can only describe as a bit of an out-of-body experience.

I was following two other cars and we were spaced out by a few hundred yards. We were headed down a slope so I, at higher elevation, could clearly see the cutoff for each car's headlights. And it was almost as if I was above my car, looking down at all three puddles of light.

Good drivers look outside of their puddle of light. They look into the darkness and watch for movements, reflections and shadows that look out of place. Bad drivers can only see that cutoff of illumination, they cannot see outside of their puddle of light.

I have had several deep conversations with three close friends today. We mostly talked about general things and it was good to catch up with all of them. My most profound conversation was with my Reverend. She and I bounced ideas off each other almost as if we were riffing of each others comments and ideas. I greatly appreciate the fact that each time we talk, I learn something from my younger friend. As much as I may have held her hand in the past, she continues to hold mine as I wander through this life.

All three conversations I had deal directly with these puddles of light. The author Paulo Coelho has written on how most people tend to operate in the small sphere of space around their bodies. They walk with their eyes down, looking only to the next footstep. They don't see the people, the architecture, the landscape or the majestic beauty of life that surrounds them. Instead, they operate step to step and point to point without getting involved in all that revolves around their small orb, their small puddle of light.

We need to always hold our eyes to the horizon. We need to acknowledge those friends and strangers that surround us. We need to acknowledge the beauty that can be found in even the most mundane aspects of life. And, perhaps most importantly, we need to realize how our actions, even in our small puddle of light, can so dramatically affect everyone around us. This occurs in all we do. Our relationships with our partners and friends, how we work with others in the office or on the ice, how we acknowledge the strangers who approach us on the sidewalk and how we deal with life in general. I've been doing my best to hold my eyes to the horizon and I am amazed at what I get to see.

A bachelor weekend in review

Tonight, i got to play hockey. And I felt strong and young...I was pulling away from other players with very effort. I was completing tape to tape passes to guys who didn't even expect to receive a pass but who were in perfect position to head up ice or shoot. I was making it look easy and I was feeling pretty good about myself (except for my backhand). My legs felt light and I didn't slow down as the game progressed.

But I suppose my legs will always feel light when I have spent the morning skiing at Loveland. 2 inches of fresh which had wind loaded into 5 inches at higher elevations. It was a bluebird day, the wind was low and the temps stayed in the 20's. It was a perfect day to ski and I'm happy that I had such a wonderful first day of skiing in over a year. And I was lucky enough to spend my time following Dave as he led me all over his mountain.

Perhaps my back stayed loose as I was playing hockey because I had spent all afternoon hunched over cleaning the stove, running the vacuum around the house and moving a great deal of furniture as I rearranged the bedroom (hey, the wife is gone, I can do whatever I want).

Or maybe I was feeling so strong because I had reffed two pro hockey games this weekend (Friday and Saturday night). Those skates certainly get my blood flowing!

Now that I think about it...I'm pretty worked from the weekend. I may need to hire a personal masseuse.

A new twig

Hockey players tend to the finicky side of things when it comes to their gear. I have been playing with the same curve and stick flex for the past ten years. Nothing else seems to work well for me, free gear included.

I purchased two new sticks two weeks ago. They are top of the line twigs, the same that the pros use. Pure carbon fiber goodness. While they are the newest stick on the market, they are still the same curve and same flex as the ones I have been using for the past decade.

Yet I have struggled with them for the past two weeks. Only tonight was I able to finally figure out how to receive a pass, stick handle and begin shooting. Last week was an utter disaster. I could not do a thing right and I attributed it all to how light the new sticks were. I thought I was not compensating enough given the change in weight. A similar phenomenon occurred when I first upgraded my old skates from high school to the lighter, stiffer skates of the 2000's. I was extending too far in my crossovers because the skate was so light and had to adjust.

So for the past two games I have been trying desperately to adjust. Tonight I began to get a handle on it. I could move with the puck. I could shoot...sort of. I could receive and make perfect tape to tape passes. But the backhand was still eluding me. And as much as I progressed, I could not seem to receive a pass or do anything right with my back hand. The puck would constantly seem to slip past me.

As I left the rink tonight, I discovered why. All of my adjustments to this point have been in how I cup the puck, how I cradle the pass and how I roll my wrists. As I was walking out, I noticed that the lie of the blade was different.

For the non-hockey folk out there, the lie is essentially the angle the blade takes as it points away from the shaft (insert whatever juvenile comment you need to here).

So, I know now that the final adjustment I need to make is how I hold my hands in relation to my body. This will directly impact whether all or very little of the blade is in contact with the ice the next time I receive a pass on my back hand. And I look forward to it!

Empty house

It's funny. My friends and I joked about how having the family gone would allow for more sleep and give me the weekend off. Hope and I joked about it too. I was looking forward to having a quiet weekend by myself.

But here I am walking into an empty house and it doesn't feel right. All the standard things I have been doing are missing. I always check on Emi when I walk in to make sure she is sleeping alright. There is an empty spot in the bed where the love of my life is usually asleep next to me. Even Gibson seems a little bummed that no one is around.

I miss them. It is safe to say I'd rather give up a little sleep to have Hope and Emi around than to be hanging out in this empty house.

They can't come home soon enough.

A Weekend Off

I've been contemplating the upcoming weekend for quite some time. I have a weekend off from parenting. A long weekend, too!

I'm already scheduled to work two Central League games. I'm already planning a ski day at Loveland. And I'm already planning to get some sleep.

At the same time, it is hard to imagine going three days/nights without Emiko in the house. She has become such a fixture and a joy that having her gone is almost depressing. But Emi is traveling with Hope to visit the only surviving great-grandmother. I'm actually a bit jealous that I don't get to go with them.

Time for a change

I'll take you back to fall '08. It was a colder day and I broke out the barn coat for my morning commute to work. Hope took one look at the jacket and announced that it was time for me to retire my venerable coat.

I've had it ever since my mother purchased it for me at Reny's my senior year of high school. That's like fourteen years. Fourteen! I wore it through college, I've worn it to rinks, I've worn it to two jobs in the past 10 years.

But she was right. It was torn, stained, and threadbare in places. Time for a replacement.

So I started searching ("searching" being the masculine term for shopping). I wanted something that would last just as long, look relatively the same but offer a little more protection from the elements. I settled on finding a waxed cotton jacket and began searching LL Bean, Eddie Bauer, Cabella's and other various shops. To no avail.

And then the answer. Hoogie pointed out that he had a jacket from Filson that met all my requirements. A quick trip to the local Filson outlet was proof enough that it was the jacket I wanted. And then some!

With Hope's approval, I soon had my jacket on order. Mind you, this was in November. And I've waited patiently for everything to arrive. The wool liners came in first and the jacket itself arrived today. Appropriately, I wore my old barn coat this morning to keep the chill out, not knowing that my new jacket was about to show up. I'll miss the old one but I'm ready to make the change.

Sushi!

I win...Miss Molly owes me a sushi dinner.

And the pact starts anew....

A Class Act

I went to see the Av's game with Sally yesterday afternoon. Ok, ok. I went to see the Av's with Sally yesterday.

As you can tell, it wasn't much of a game. But I noticed this. There were way too many high sticks. Some were called, some were not and some were from the same team. During the second period, one Duck got smoked behind his net by his own team mate. He dropped to the ice and had sprung a pretty good leak.

Here is where the class act occurred. Generally, the frozen puddle of blood is left to the linesmen to take care of. Instead, the Duck's team captain, Scott Niedermayer, stayed behind after his team mate was escorted from the ice and scraped up the blood himself. He helped on of the rink's staff get it onto a shovel. And then he skated to his bench.

Niedermayer didn't have to do this. But he did. He paused and took a moment from his focus on the game at hand to help out the rink crew. It's the little gestures like this that make certain people such class acts. And Scott Niedermayer is certainly one of them.