On Frozen Pond

It was hockey from early morn to the darkening shades
of late afternoon with only a short break for a quickly devoured
Campbell's Vegetable Soup for lunch. My closest friend was Ken. You very
rarely saw one of us without the other, we were inseparable. Our hockey sticks
were battered and thin and only bore a slight resemblance to hockey sticks
we got each year for Christmas. The pond was a wide frozen body of water
beside a well traveled highway to the distant land called the United States.
But in our minds it was The Montreal Forum filled with screaming fans
cheering on our every move. We would take turns being the great Maurice
“The Rocket” Richard while the other would be all-star goalie Jacques Plante!
It could have been minus 20 degrees Fahrenheit but we never felt the cold
and icy winds... we were superstars.

On a few occasions I have revisited that hallowed ground where we spent
hour upon hour, oblivious to time, our faces frozen as well as our ears
and our toes! The cheering of the imaginary crowds was all the
inspiration we needed to fire a blistering shot through the imaginary pads each
other was wearing. At the end of the day, we literally had to crawl home on
our hands and knees, our ankles no longer being able to support our tired legs.

Those sweet memories have stayed with me for a lifetime. I'm sure with
my last breath of life, the vision of Ken and me will flash before my eyes.
Ah yes, hockey, it was what young Canadian boys lived for back then!