Hockey Cures All Ills

I saw my first hockey game, and everything changed.

Archives for September 2018

Gearing Up

by

Ah, the non-hockey smell of brand new gear (even the pre-owned skates were oddly innocuous).

Had I known hockey involved garters, I would have signed up years ago, if only for the beautiful incongruity of all those sharp edges and armor-like accoutrements offset by a throw-back item more likely to evoke a hitchhiking Claudette Colbert than Ranger great Rod Gilbert. But these bland, utilitarian hockey garters are needed to hold up your socks, which go over your shin pads. The alternative is a newer Velcro socks/shorts combination, a disappointing choice made by a distressing number of people. Honestly, where is the fun in that? I intended to fully embrace this exceedingly amusing contradiction, especially as garters were the only things besides the gloves and skates that I had tried on before.

Oh, there were so many things to figure out on that Saturday in the Rockville Total Hockey. Because I had help, it was way less stressful and far more successful than my previous gear near-meltdown. Within an hour or two, I had everything I needed in the right size and configuration:

  • Skates
  • Socks for skates (not everybody uses these—the choice is yours)
  • Shin pads
  • Hockey socks
  • Sock tape
  • Hockey garters
  • Hockey pants
  • Shoulder pads
  • Elbow pads
  • Jersey
  • Helmet
  • Mouthguard
  • Gloves

Amazingly enough, I even knew how to put it all on. Whether I would remember how to do so when I went to the rink at some vague point in the future was another question for another day.

On this day, I had answers for gear success:

  1. Ask around before you buy. You can get a sense of what will work best for you by asking other players what they prefer and why. Even people using hand-me-down gear can tell you if they like it or not. These insights are super helpful. Also, other players may have gear they are willing to give away or sell that is brand new or slightly used. I got my hockey pants that way—brand new with tags.
  2. Figure out how much and which borrowed/used gear you are willing to use. Especially if you are not sure you will stick with hockey, you may want to borrow gear or buy it used. If you are a germaphobe, you may want to buy it all new anyway. Keep in mind that “used” sometimes is brand new because someone figured out quickly it would not work but held onto it for whatever reason. Again, asking other players is the best source for this because you may find gear from them or they may suggest rinks, programs, or stores that offer used items.
  3. Take a friend with you who knows about hockey gear. This may seem obvious, but I know many people who just went on their own to buy gear the first time and ended up with items that did not work for them. That is the chance you take with any new endeavor when you don’t know exactly what you want because you have never used any of the equipment before. Having a female hockey player accompany me to the store stopped me from making several bad decisions because she knew the right questions to ask of me and of the staff. I cannot emphasize enough how much she saved the day.
  4. Try it all on again before going to the rink. If you are going to an early morning stick ‘n’ puck, you may be the only one in the women’s locker room and have no one to ask if you are confused. Or, you may be like me and not want to ask anyway because you don’t want to look like as much of an idiot off the ice as you know you will look once you are out there. Putting on gear becomes second nature, but at first, it can be confusing as anything. Most hockey players are super friendly and happy to help with gear questions. But, if you are the sort of person who worries about the one grouchy jerk who exists to make others feel stupid, then try it all on again at home before you try it at the rink.
  5. Figure out what to wear under the gear. I knew about this thanks to the female hockey player who went with me to the store. It never even occurred to me that this might matter, but I found a shirt cut for women that I loved that also helped my elbow pads stay in place. I decided to wear the leggings I wore for ice skating with this shirt, and voila! I could walk into any rink with any changing situation with no worries. All I had to do was put my gear over the shirt and the leggings and I was good to go, and the reverse worked perfectly, albeit with lots more sweat, afterward. Whether a rink had a co-ed locker room, no changing area, or a women’s bathroom, I was ready to arrive and depart in a way that was comfortable for me. Changing areas vary wildly by rink, and it is good to be prepared for any possibility. I mean, there are garters involved here—if you’re doing it the right way.

Transitions

by

When you have a stick you can work on hockey skills off the ice with a ball instead of a puck. I had a stick and a practice ball, but I also have a cat who would foil my attempts to stickhandle across my house’s hardwood floors. Poor Buster took a stick to his face for his efforts, and I ended up in the emotional penalty box. No Norris Trophy for Buster and lots of questions for me. I needed to take my stick to an ice rink to practice. But, to meet rink requirements, I would need something I dreaded: gear.

Lots of people like gadgets and equipment and fiddling with said and arguing about which of this or that is the right one, the best one, the cool one. I am not one of those people. Until very recently, my only approach to computers, cars, stereos, guitars, amps, guns, tools, and so forth was to ask a self-appointed expert that I knew to tell me what I should buy given my various idiosyncratic requirements and then I would go get it. “My guitar needs to sound like a Les Paul but weigh less than an SG.” Lo and behold one of my gearhead buddies knew exactly what to suggest.

I have done this forever for two reasons: It usually works extremely well and quickly, and more important, I hate fiddling with things that don’t work immediately. I don’t have a tinkerer’s temper. I angrily toss first and ask questions about the wreckage later. I am my father’s daughter in this regard; as age has mellowed me somewhat, I have gone from the one who could not work with him on projects to the only one who can. Our results in this new partnership have been good, even if the outdoor peacock house we built ultimately went up and then down in flames. Still not sure how that exactly happened, but all critters, humans, and other structures were spared because of mom’s quick thinking.

Like my father—and I am sure many others—I want to push play and have something work. I don’t need, want, or tolerate long conversations with new televisions. (It goes without saying that I am not an early adopter of anything except Fluevogs.) Although not likely to ever be an engineer, I did find hockey at a time when I had learned the value of process. Many years spent learning and teaching pilates had shown me the merit of getting lost in pursuits I could not control or fully understand, regardless of the outcome. For the first time, I was okay with working on and learning skills I might never master. Even so, my overall troubleshooting threshold is not high, although hammers and electronics fly less frequently.

So, it was endlessly amusing and confusing that I had fallen in love with a sport that required lots of fussing around with foreign objects. The skates and stick were bad enough, but I was getting the hang of their upkeep: the skate blade sharpening, the wax laces that initially required a pull to tighten, the continuing questions about my stick’s weight. I was concerned about the stick’s peeling tape, though. What was I supposed to do about that? I was ignoring it for the moment, unless given a good reason otherwise.

And, it got even more confusing on my first trip to the hockey store. I was dizzy. So many gloves. So many sticks. So many pads. A helmet that needed endless adjustments by an extremely helpful staff. I wanted to bolt when they had to replace the cage with a smaller one. More adjustments, screws, tinkering. Would this work? I had no idea. I bought kid-sized gloves. Did that make sense?

Excited but exhausted, I left with my initial loot and immediately emailed an expert. No way I could sort this out on my own, and I didn’t have to because the first woman I had ever seen play also was extremely willing to help me conquer the gear fear. I just had to ask. It was becoming a trend, this asking and receiving, this learning to wonder and not immediately press play, a trusting that whatever I needed would eventually find its way to me when it was time for the next question.