Hockey Mom?

I guess I am almost now an official "Hockey Mom". I thought I should probably make mention of the fact well in advance that I was not really aspiring to ever be a "Hockey Mom"! You see, I was quite content being a "Soccer Mom" and a "Baseball Mom" and a "Working Mom". But the "Hockey Mom" just conjures up a whole new image. Which is an image I have never wanted to be seen as. Oh, I've toyed around with various images in my life - there were times when I portrayed (or hoped to portray) the image of the typical "campus student" (complete with toga). There was the daytime image of Florence Nightingale (yes, in my dental assistant duds). Then there was the image of the golfer (a complete lie, really) as I handed out my golfing advice and tips on weekends at the golf courses where I also worked. Oh, there are other images which were relatively short-lived (thank Heavens!) too. But Hockey Mom was never one of the ones I'd planned on.........

Naturally, I should have seen the writing on the wall. Aside from the fact I am related to a famous person on "Hockey Night in Canada" (Ron MacLean is my second cousin), I am not really from a die-hard "hockey" family. My dad certainly enjoyed watching hockey - if it wasn't conflicting with a basketball or baseball game on t.v., that is. And, as a teen, I loved going to both the WHL (remember the WHA Vancouver Blazers?) and my friends' games. Then I married R - who is from a real die-hard hockey family. R played hockey, his dad played hockey, his sister played hockey, his mom was on the minor hockey board, and on it goes. R has taken only a temporary break from hockey due to work and the house, but up until a year ago, he still played on a fairly regular basis. And, his dad also played regularly while they were still living in the lower mainland. They are NHL fanatics - growing up in a house where the game was always on. And, when I started dating R, he and his roommates had built BLEACHERS in their living room for hockey viewing purposes! You see, my husband LOVES hockey - and J, his "mini-me" was bound to follow suit...

So, over this past year it has become more apparent that J has definitely become more and more interested in the sport. By October he really wanted to play hockey - and we registered him for a fun hockey program on Wednesday nights all season (minor hockey registration was closed). And yes he was keen - much keener that he was on the soccer field dripping with rain. To top this off, his teacher's son plays for the Memorial Cup winning Vancouver Giants - so we went fairly often to see those exciting games. You see, I like hockey a lot too - I just haven't been particularly warm and fuzzy over some of the parents I've witnessed in the stands.

For the 3 years I have been a "Soccer Mom", I have never experienced (or seen) any cat fights out on the Soccer sidelines! Registration for soccer includes a parental contract - where we sign a form promising to keep the game friendly and fun for the kids - but I didn't see any such animal (ie parental form) during hockey registration. Heck, we were drinking coffee with (and clapping for) our opponents in soccer. The same goes for baseball. We know the other team's kids and we cheer each other on! That makes it fun! It is my observation that Minor hockey just seems so much more competitive, confrontational (and rough!). I know that I personally will have no comfort in a sea of aggressive fans who take the game far too seriously - yelling obscenities at the refs, coaches, team-mates, opponents, and their OWN kids. This is speaking from experience, I worked within several municipal arenas for over 20 years and I witnessed this almost every time I worked there. I remember rolling my eyes and telling my co-workers "did you hear that? I will never let any kid of mine play this sport!". It wasn't necessarily the game, it was the mentality of these parents living vicariously through their kids - envisioning them to be the next great NHL legend and fighting their kids' perceived obstacles all the way!

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At any rate, I am now officially signed on as a full-fledged hockey mom - happy our child is doing the sport he is so crazy about, but actually very very nervous about joining ranks with these very "intense" groups of hockey parents!