The Epistle of Q — Chapter Thirty-Eight

Do you want to know why Grandkids are special?
Well, I suppose if you have some yourself you already have a pretty good idea. But humour me for a few minutes and let me tell you a little bit about my American Twins.
You see, my daughter married a really neat guy. In fact, as son-in-laws go, he is the best. The fact he has three passports (born in Australia of an American mother and Canadian father, grew up in greater Edmonton, Alberta) might make him somewhat special to begin with. But the much bigger accolade is that he not only married my daughter, but has stayed with her. And at times I’m sure that has been a bit trying!! Nevertheless they have collaborated to produce and raise three very talented and wonderful boys.
The first two are twins — that means that not only are they the same age, they were born on the same day. And, they even look alike, although I can now tell them apart — partly because they have different haircuts!! And while they have deep Canadian blood which is demonstrated most in their passion for hockey, even there they are different — one is a goalie and his hero is Marc-Andre Fleury of the Pittsburgh Penguins (he even wears #29), the other really likes Chicago’s #2 (Duncan Keith who hails from Penticton, believe it or not) and he wears his number.

They play minor hockey in the Greater Phoenix area throughout the autumn & winter (if you can call 20C winter) and in the spring and summer they go to development camps or play in special tournaments. This past winter they also played for their high school hockey team (yes, high schools in Arizona do support hockey teams). They love being on the ice…

This past weekend they were part of a team (Team Northwest) that was invited to play in a Triple A Bantam tournament in Canmore Alberta. I decided it would be a good idea, since they were so close (it’s only a seven hour drive), to go over and watch them play. (I missed the first game as there was a unique musical event in Kelowna — the Okanagan Symphony teamed up with Ballet Kelowna for a spectacular show which I will describe at another time under my recent musical madness commentary). Anyway, got to Canmore in time for the second game of the tourney. Even though they had been beaten quite decisively in the first game, they were not discouraged and played a strong game and held their opponents to a 4-4 draw.

Saturday saw them up against two very strong Alberta teams — one from Edmonton and one from the Red Deer/Sylvan Lake area. Very quickly it was evident that Team Northwest was in deep. As they were an amalgam of players from Arizona, Oregon, Utah, & Iowa and only had a couple of practices together before the tournament, they were not as coordinated in their passing and positional play. Nevertheless they competed hard (plus, in many ways they really were only a Double A level team in terms of Canadian hockey norms). During the two games that afternoon, both twins got some playing time. The goalie was always designated as the back-up and so only played in one of the games while the defenceman, due to an unfortunate injury to a team-mate, was moved up to forward. The transition was relatively successful as he scored two goals.

Come Sunday morning, of the five teams, Team Northwest (the American squad) was seeded fourth. It entered the playdowns against the #1 team (the Blazers) in the first game. This team was the elite of the tourney. Several of their players were “all Alberta” and they quickly showed what that meant. By the end of the first period it was 5-0 and by the mid-point of the game it was 7-0. The Team NW coach decided to give his #1 goalie a rest (which you shall soon learn, was a smart move), and so my Grandson got to play more than a complete period (which was a real bonus for us as well didn’t expect to see him play at all). He was scored upon another five times. But during that time, Team NW managed to score three goals, all from their number one player.

While they lost the game, they still had one more outing, against the #5 ranked team — basically the B squad of the #1 team — quite talented but perhaps not quite as fast. As Team NW had tied this squad on Friday, their spirits were very positive starting this final playoff game. They managed to skate faster and kept up, most of the time, to this team (called the Canucks). More importantly, they scored the first goal and that really seemed to energize them. Their #1 goalie, well-rested now, played a very strong first period and by the second period Team NW was leading 4-0. When the Canucks finally scored to make it 4-1, the NW boys turned up the heat and quickly score a fifth goal. As the third period wound down the Canucks, due to some interesting penalty calls on Team NW (on a couple of occasions with two players in the penalty box the on-ice situation was actually 5 on 3), scored two goals — one with their own goalie pulled in favour of a sixth attacker.

Nevertheless, Team Northwest prevailed winning by a 5-3 score. Their faces told it all afterwards. They were beaming. But they also were now a smarter group of kids. They realized that Canadian hockey is faster and hits harder than its Arizona counterpart. Just because the young Maple Leaf phenom, Auston Matthews, comes from Arizona, that doesn’t mean that everyone from that state is automatically an All-Star. This tournament experience will give them more motivation and perhaps even inspiration to work very hard this July when they travel to Penticton to attend a week at the Okanagan Hockey Academy.

But, never mind the score or the #4 ranking, I am very proud of the Twins. It isn’t easy being a back-up when all season you were the #1 goalie on your team. Going from being a top-four defenceman to a third-string left winger takes a good deal of adjustment — scoring two goals though, shows there are some serious hockey smarts inside the brain nonetheless!! It was fun watching them play. It was special, being able to be in the stands and let them know that they had real support. And, it was great to have meals afterwards so we could reinforce our feelings of pride by having interesting and focused conversations with them.

Grandkids, once they become teen-agers, develop their own friendship circles and grandparents aren’t quite a vital. As a result Grandparents need to adapt and show their love and support in ways that the teens can best appreciate. In the case of the Twins, this weekend showed us that they really appreciate our support in the stands. Even when they are not doing well on the ice, it is still motivational for them when they look up in a strange arena, and see familiar faces from their own family tree. Your grandkids might be into other pursuits but whatever those might be — make sure that you take time to connect with them on those levels and in those pursuits. You don’t have to do the same things with them — just make sure that you validate that what they are choosing to do is good and you are proud of them…

g.w.