I first started heading to the games when I moved up here, 'cause it seemed like a "community" thing. Boy, was I right. Everyone shows up to the games... I mean, The population of the town of fairbanks (excluding outlying areas) is suppsedly something like 40000. Well, on a good night, such as our games agains Michigan, or --even better-- against Anchorage, we have a sellout crowd of 4500. That's more than 10% of the population showing up for the games.
When I moved to Alaska, one of my first purchases, aside from thermal underwear, was a pair of hockey skates. The people I worked with (at that point, volunteered with) got together once a week to play a friendly game of pick-up hockey. We played in the neighboring town of Esther, next door to a fire-department that would spray down an outdoor basketball court. Temperatures being as they are here, it only takes a few layers of water before you've got instant hockey rink.
Back then, I'd only been on skates once before-- at someones birthday party, I'm sure. It was difficult to see anything as we skated around at minus such-and-such, with eyelashes knitted together. Mostly, I just did small circles in the center of the rink, as people better (and faster) than I whizzed about in every which direction; occasionally, during the persuit of a rogue puck, they'd plow into a snowbank. Skating too close to anyone was a sure-fire way to drop them to the ice.
As the years (oh my, it's been more than two point five years, now!) progressed, the game has gotten a little more sophisticated. The transistion wasn't without growing pains. Pretty soon, the whole afair was moved indoors, to the Patty Center skating rink. Well, soon after that, it became apparent that 25 people all on the ice at the same time was an awfully rough way to try to run a game. Luckilly, collisions were still happening at slow speeds.
Soon, the field of players whittled down to teams of 6 or 7, with subbing for effect. When we decided to play intramurals, we even introduced the concept of off-sides into our "practices". Intramurals helped us with any self-esteem issues we may have had... yep, all delusions of grandure were stripped away as our 7-point handicaps were whittled away at the rate of a goal every minute or two. Invariably, the tete-a-tete became a shuffling of both-teams players as we salvaged the rest of our alloted time-slot.
These days, we're renting a bigger and better rink -- the Big Dipper. With it's luxurious lockerrooms and great ice, it's easy to be a little spoiled. The speed of the game has increased tremendously, and now, in full padding, our crashes tend to send people, pads, and sticks in every which direction. As march starts to creep up on us, the idea of intramurals is also seeping into the back of our conciousness... and this time, I look on it with interest; we just might be able to hold our own (a little) out there.
Ah, but this started with me talking about the 'nooks. They kicked butt on friday, a really fun game against Northern Michigan. But Saturday was a little painful..
