News
today that the NHL lockout was over had about as much effect on me as my
neighbour’s cat having kittens. Although for some, perhaps the Mayan calendar
was right about the end of the world.
The newscaster assumes hockey is everybody’s game, and we
are all waiting breathlessly for it to start again. I’m breathing quite
normally thank you, even though the media hype suggests that this makes me almost
un-Canadian; perhaps not even really human.
It seems to me, the more virulent the raving over the game,
the shallower that individual’s world is. After all, it’s not playing the game
but winning at all costs that counts—so much so it incites violence on the rink
and riots outside, aping soccer riots in worlds other than our own.
Hockey is one of several things that make me different to
the average. I remember buying my wife a card which had a cartoon guy standing
on his head. The caption sums up how I feel: “Maybe it’s the world that’s
upside down. We’re the ones who are the right way up.”
