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1997

1998

I have never been accused of being sane.

In more than thirty-two years, I've been called a lot of things -- most of them are unprintable here --  but I never recall sane being one of those things.   It's little wonder then, that when the next season of instructional league hockey starts up in December, you'll be able to find me on the ice looking to get hit with the puck.

But that's only if my pads get here in time.

Realistically, I can't think of any reason why I'd want to do this.   I was never involved in sports in school.  Before last year, I never really ice-skated and as an Oak Cliff native, I've grown up learning to avoid small, fast-moving projectiles, not get hit with them. 

So why do this?

I got my first taste of it playing in net for the Dallas Alley broomball team.  In my first game, I made a wicked poke check that sent an opposing player sprawling.  Greatness.  About five minutes later, I took a ball to the face.   Not-so-greatness.  Unlike people playing a real sport, we wore no protection, so it hit like a fast-moving, five pound fist.  I shook it off and kept playing.   In my second game, I took a stick across the nose which send blood streaming across my face.  At that moment, one thought went through my mind:

"God, this is living!" Now, I finally have the means and the time to step on the ice and put these old bones in the line of fire.  But, why? It's not so much for the love of the sport or for some kind of affirmation of manliness, but for an affirmation of living.  That in some twisted way,

we all live our lives in the crease:  waiting on the edge of everything, at the precipice of what is and what may come.  That we all have our shots that we have to face.  That our padding only covers so much and that sometimes it's the pain that tells us we're alive.

"Get out the A-1 sauce, I'm done."