Ice Hockey In The Desert!

Hockey is Not For The Weak At Heart....or the Weak on Cash!

I had heard here and there that hockey was an expensive sport to play. But I never grew up anywhere that it was actually played, so those words meant nothing to me. But when I gave birth to my son, Chad Mikel Staley, the concept of hockey in my life was about to change more than I would have ever imagined.

For me, I was athletic all my life. Softball mostly, but dabbled in volleyball and track until I realized I was a one sport chick. So it was softball for me. No doubtedly, Chad inherited some of my athletic genes, but where he inherited his ice skating ability......I wish I knew!

Chad, who is 12 years old at the time I am writing this, is my pride and joy, my baby boy and an amazing Ice Hockey Player. You see, he has been playing hockey in one form or another since he was 5 years old. At that time, he wanted to play roller hockey with a group of older boys that would meet at an indoor soccer house once a week to play roller hockey. I thought it would be a fun adventure for him, but I never in a million years dreamed that those days would create a hockey giant that has natural, instinctive talent unlike any other player I have ever seen.

But let's take a 7 year step back in time to the first time Chad ever put stepped foot inside the roller hockey rink. Picture a short, blonde haired, blue eyed, unbelievably cute little boy trying to figure out how to skate at the same time this group of older boys (probably 7-8yr olds) were playing a real game and they weren't going to stop the game to teach a little kid how to hold a stick, how to stay on his feet, where to stand, what a net was, why you tried to get the ball in the net and they certainly didn't have time to tell him where to stand during a faceoff.

Not to mention that Chad had never seen hockey in any form before skating onto this playing field of older, wiser young men.

It was disasterous to say the least. Every time the puck was dropped, Chad was left standing all by himself as the mob of skaters with sticks and helmets swarmed around him and then took off to one end or the other to try to score on the other goalie.

I watched in horror as my little innocent boy was stuck out on the rink all by himself and no one was looking out for him. I was not allowed to intervene or pull him off the rink. He couldn't even hear me calling to him to come over to the side so I could grab him and run as fast and as far from that environment as possible. In fact, he didn't even look up at me to see if I was still watching him.

My heart hurt like it had never hurt before for him. Why did I let him go out there with these boys who carried big sticks, skated very fast and apparantly had no idea that a 5 year old first-timer was amongst them?

I began to cry like a baby and my partner who was watching the same game, asked me what I was crying for.

"Can't you see how horrible this is for him? They aren't teaching him anything. They are just pointing for him to go line up for the faceoff and he has no clue what a faceoff is or where to stand. And by the time he gets his feet under him and standing on the right side of the line, they already have dropped the ball and are half way to the goal ready to score again. Why do you think I am crying? I want him out of there and I want him out NOW!"

I blurted that all out before she could calmly put her arm around me and told me to look again.

As I peered out from my swollen, red, burning eyes and saw him talking with the big kids and asking "where do I go now?".

They pointed over to the side of the faceoff circle and he grabbed his stick and headed that way. This time he actually got his feet planted, stick towards the ground and a determined look on his face before the ball was dropped into play.

Then, as the other kids started to skate around the ball wildly, he skated right into the pack with them and poked his stick towards the ball in an attempt to help out his team, even though he had no clue which side he was on still.

Then, one boy that had been the BIG scorer for the group, turned towards Chad while he was handling the ball with his stick and said "hey, little guy......here you go" and he slapped the ball towards Chad and then skated slower and tapped his stick on the ground as if calling for him to hit it back to him like he just did.

Chad smiled and did his very best to make his stick hit that ball and although he missed it miserably, the game continued as if he hit it and no one laughed at him or even seemed to notice.

They played for about an hour total, and then the Soccerhouse crew blew the whistle, signaling the kids that their hockey time was up and they needed to get out of the rink so the next group could start.

Whew, I thought.

It is finally over and I can take my baby home now and tell him how sorry I was for making him endure such a bad experience.

As he skated over towards me at the side of the indoor rink, he was smiling bigger than I could ever remember him smiling before. I was curious what it was all about, so I asked him why he was smiling so big? He looked confused but answered proudly.."That was the best! Can I come again next week?"

Well, I guess you can imagine what happened after that....he played two more weeks with the same group of boys and loved every minute of it. At the end of the last session, one of fathers of another player came up to my partner and I and asked if Chad had ever skated on ice before? We said no, in fact he has only been on roller blades these 3 times.

Then he told us that we should really get him on the ice in skates because if he skated as well as he did on roller blades, he would be even better on the ice!

I was shocked to say the least. Someone thought that my little boy who was teetering on his roller blades was a good skater! I thanked him for his kind words and then we left.

We did take him to the ice rink, put him on skates, and he has never "figuratively" taken them off since. Chad has been on ice skates playing Ice Hockey every day of his life since then and boy is he an amazing athlete with skill that flies far beyond his 12 yrs of age.

So, they do play Ice Hockey in the Desert.We live in the Tri-Cities, Wa. We are surrounded by dust piles & no trees or mountains to speak of. But we have two ice rinks, the Tri City Americans WHL ice hockey franchise & Ice Hockey thrives. But the best part is that my son, Chad Staley, is right in the heart of it!

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