Posted: Friday, February 11, 2011 11:40 pm
Local volunteers score with new skating rink Commentary by Jay Heater
I guess my friends and I were about 13 when we caught hockey fever.
We had been skating for years at various ponds around our rural area in upstate New York, and most often at the pond that was in the back corner of my parents’ property.
The memories of those times are fond ones, a bunch of kids making like they were NHL stars, using every last sliver of sunlight and then trudging home through the snow, which often was up to our knees.
Even when we were 10 or 11, we did whatever we could to keep the ice surface primed for skating. If it was snowing, the moment that final flake hit the ground, we were making our way back to the pond with shovels. Our driveway hadn’t been plowed, but the pond had been cleared. It was a big deal.
Then one of the kids in the neighborhood showed up with hockey skates. Skating in our neighborhood changed.
We all had been wearing figure skates because, at that time, they were easier to find and less expensive. Every little kid had figure skates, but hockey skates were a different animal. When that first pair of hockey skates showed up at the pond, the rest of us were in awe.
I loved watching the New York Rangers (hockey on my 12-inch, black and white television), and of course, that’s what they wore. Long, long blades, pointy at both ends. No way to put on the brakes except by turning to the slide and sawing off a layer of ice. Wow, I had to have a pair.
Hockey skates went to the top of my wish list, and it wasn’t long before I, and every other kid in the neighborhood, had the long blades. I still remember that first skating session, doing a forward face plant when I tried to use the front of the skate to get going. Of course, there were none of those ridges to grab the ice. It was a painful introduction.
By the time we were 13, all the other equipment started showing up. Those padded hockey pants, the heavy gloves, better sticks and real goals instead of the pieces of wood we had hammered together. Before long, it looked like we actually had real hockey teams out there.
A couple of years down the road, we thought we were pretty good. We used to travel to other tiny towns for a weekend match. Some of the kids on our team were older and they drove. Unfortunately, we couldn’t get any regular competition.
So the decision was made, we were going to join a league at the nearest indoor rink. Unfortunately, the nearest rink was more than an hour away. It didn’t matter … we were going.
We soon discovered that renting ice time for practice wasn’t the easiest thing to do. We all pitched in the funds, but we had to practice at times like 7 a.m. That meant waking up at 5 a.m., getting together and making the drive. You stepped on the ice at 7 a.m. sharp and had to be gone at 7:59.
So that first morning, we unloaded from the cars and went into the arena, laced on our official hockey skates and went through the opening on the boards to the ice. It turned into a game of 10-man Twister.
Our smooth pond ice was more like gravel when compared to the Zamboni-prepped surface. We were useless from the waste down as our legs all went different directions as our hands lurched forward to break our falls. We looked like the typical 5-year-old at the rink for the first time without daddy to hold our hand.
Some of us crawled toward the boards for support and made our way to our feet. This was going to take some time.
Off to the side was a former minor league hockey player who was getting quite a kick from our 10 Stooges act. He asked if we were serious about learning to play. We told him we were.
So he agreed to coach us on one condition … that we join a league of 12 and under kids.
Considering we were mostly 17 to 15, it was … well … humiliating. Reluctantly, we agreed and played that first season as these half pints skated circles around us game after game. But after repetition and practice, our goal was accomplished. In only a few months, we were ready to move to our own age group. We might not have won many games, but it was victory at last.
All those memories came streaming back to me on Thursday as I walked along the ice at the Chubbuck Pocatello Hockey Association’s new arena at Capell Park.
The rink’s ribbon cutting will be 1 p.m. today. Some visitors will see used boards, conditioned by a used Zamboni and constructed by a crew of volunteers.
But those who know what it’s like to drive more than an hour to find a rink, who love to circle the ice until the evening sun slips away, who get a warm feeling by sliding along the cold surface, to them it’s a beautiful, wonderful sight.
Congratulations to all those volunteers who brought something really special to our community. Now I have to buy some hockey skates
