Adult Entertainment

At the rink where the boys play hockey there is a poster placed in several prominant places that lists the "Code of Conduct" for the players and "Code of Conduct" for the parents. Both lists emphasize fair play, sportsmanship, effort and development over winning - an obvious effort to discourage acts of "hockey parents" in the stands. The first on the parents' list says something to the effect of 'my child plays hockey for his/her enjoyment not for mine'. Whomever wrote that has never watched an hour of Halifax Rec Mini Gliders.

The girls are enrolled in skating for the first time this term. They both received helmets for Christmas and skates shortly after (PJ for her bday, AW b/c she needed them). The first session they were on their bums for 90% of the time. With each week they've gotten progressively better, staying on their feet longer and getting up faster when they fall. Today was the best yet, and by far the funniest to watch.

Paxten was in tears most of the first session, but has gotten over the frustration of not being perfect at it the first try. Today she was super proud to move forward without falling. She holds her right foot VERY still and straight and pushes ever so slightly back with her left foot. Her arms are held gracefully out to either side as straight as possible, a big grin on her face. But when she fell she laid there. She'd lie on her back watching around her, roll over onto her stomach with her helmet in her hands and her feet kicked up over her bum. Once I saw her sitting cross-legged by the boards pushing the snow around on the ice with her mits.

AnnaWen has more tenacity. She shuffles on both feet, inching forward at a snail's pace. For a while during their lesson they were given plastic hockey sticks and bright orange practice pucks. No one had possession over one puck, it was a freeforall with everyone skating towards a puck and 'passing' it as far as they could before skating to the next. She scoped out a puck, snail shufflfed towards it. More often than not another skater would get there first and shoot the puck away. She'd stop, look around for the next closest puck and head in that direction instead. A couple of times she would get almost there, and in her excitment and effort to move her stick towards it would loose her balance and fall. Of course the fall had her twisted around and backwards to the target. While she righted herself invariably someone else would come along, swat the puck away, then continue on. She'd stand up, turn back to where the puck was and stand stupified by it's disappearance. When her teacher handed her the stick, it was placed in her hands in a perfect two-handed hockey grip and she skated well keeping both hands on the shaft, blade on the ice. Each time she fell, she'd pick herself back up and bend over to get the stick. And each time, she seemed to place her hands further and further down the shaft. Before long, she had both hands down by the blade, which was fine while she inched along the ice - she just held the shaft poked out behind her - but when she actually DID reach a puck first, she had to bend over at the waist to reach the blade to the ice and try to hit the puck without the benefit of torque.

So, while I understand that it's important to remember that kids' sports are for thier benefit, not their parents', I was pretty entertained by the girls today. In the car PJ asked me why AnnaWen was better than her at staying up if she was bigger and older (cause you know, two months is a lifetime of life experience). I had been worried that she would notice that Wen was doing better and would get discouraged - both she and Jack like to be good at everything they try - so I was careful in how I answered. I said "Well, some people are really good at some things and some people are really good at other things. Everyone is good at something, but it's not always the same". Without missing a beat she said in all seriousness "Well I what I'm good at is falling down".

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