Sometimes the dream takes time

When I was growing up in southern Indiana, I heard of a sport called hockey. I knew nothing about it, but was intrigued about it. I went to the local library and read every book they had on the subject. There weren’t that many, but I read them all. None of them were instructional, only fictional stories of those who played. Growing up where I did, there was very little chance of ice skating. There were no rinks, and the length of local lakes freezing time was fairly short.

Then we had a span of years where the lakes in Garvin Park actually froze over for a month or two. O had no allowance for income but had a way of collecting soda bottles to get some money. Six soda bottles returned would give me twelve cents, the price of the neighborhood theater. I used this method to get some money to purchase a pair of speed skates at the local Salvation Army store for a quarter. To say I learned to skate using them didn’t really happen. I did manage to be able to stand up and get around the lake on them.

About this time my dad came up with a little gift for me. It was a radio with a speaker that slipped under the pillow. I could listen to it without anyone knowing it was even on. I don’t know where he got it i, but was either from the junk yard or the Salvation Army store. I discovered I could get the radio broadcast of the Chicago Blackhawks games with Johnny Gottselig as the announcer. I listened to as many of those as i could without my parents knowing I wasn’t asleep.

Many years later when we were living in Rockford Illinois, my son Dan who was six heard about a group starting up a hockey club. He wanted to be a part of it. So, I took him to the meeting. There I learned that as a parent, I had to either be on the board, raise money, or coach. I went out and got a pair of hockey skates and quickly learned how to skate. This led to my having twenty-two years as a hockey coach and satisfying my boyhood dream of the sport.