no internet – sydney – temperamental teenager

as i opened my laptop this morning there was a message from mandy quiney, the wife of one of my streatham team mates peter.

she reads the blog, and is a big supporter of bigmoose, having recently celebrated her birthday wing walking and fundraising for us, and we keep in touch regularly.

and it got me thinking.

when i was seventeen i used to play sunday league football, which took me to various destinations across london.

and this one sunny sunday afternoon, returning from a game, i had the roof down on my red triumph herald, my first car, (one like this beautiful model in the photo above) and as the radio crackled i heard somebody talking about an ice hockey game which was taking place in streatham that afternoon.

at that moment, my life changed.

i pulled up outside the streatham ice rink and could hear the crowd cheering within the bowels of the arena.

the game had already started and there was nobody to pay to watch the game, so i walked up the stairs and onto the balcony, where i could see the two teams and the crowd going crazy.

the score, two all, and streatham attacking the end i was standing above, near where the goal was.

the noise was deafening. the atmosphere electric.

‘redskins, redskins, redskins’ the crowd chanted.

there was a break in play and a faceoff at our end.

the streatham centre won the draw and got the puck back to the right wing who took a wrist shot and i saw the twine netting bulge as the volcanic rubber puck hit the back of the net.

the crowd went wild and i knew that i needed to come back to playing ice hockey.

two years prior to that afternoon i had chosen to quit the sport that i had been playing for five years due to a disagreement with our coach, and teenage temperament on my part.

standing on that balcony, watching and listening to the crowd’s passion and the excitement on the ice, made me realise that i’d missed my sport, and what transpired to be my vocation and my career.

i drove home across the river from south london back to north london where i lived, my mind racing, thinking about how i wanted to be on the ice playing in those games.

i found a number for the streatham ice rink in the phone book, as there was no internet at this time.

no websites, no social media, nothing but landlines and phone books.

but i found the person that i needed to speak to and asked whether i could come along for a training session.

they told me that their b team trained on a saturday morning, and i’d be welcome to come along if i had my own kit.

i loaded up my trusty herald and made the ten mile journey to south london’s streatham high road.

as i walked into the dressing room, not knowing a soul, i could smell that dressing room smell hitting my nostrils.

it’s the same in every ice hockey dressing room across the world.

pungent, sweaty, and i love it.

it’s evocative.

it now reminds me of some of the best times of my life.

as i stepped on the ice having not skated for over two years, trusting my thin, five millimetre blades to carry me and propel me forwards and backwards on the milky ice.

i was instructed to head towards the goal, turned and faced the players.

one shot.

thud, it hit my leg pads.

second shot, high to my left hand side, and it fitted snugly into my catching glove.

i was back, and loving it.

by the end of the training session i had lost over a pound in weight through sweating.

as i sat in the dressing room undressing, i realised another element of what i had missed with ice hockey, which was the dressing room banter.

and i listened to the teammates duelling with each other verbally, with lots of comedy, and a good spirit.

i spent the next year training, playing games, and improving myself, to show the coaches that i had the ability to make the step from b team to a team, the team that i’d watched on that sunny sunday afternoon.

my phone rang and i heard the cockney dulcet tones of alec goldstone, the a team manager.

he informed me that one of their goalies had got injured, and they needed a backup for the next weekend’s game, and was i available?

my heart raced.

“absolutely, what are the details?”

“meet outside the ice rink at three pm sunday afternoon.”

“brilliant, i’ll see you there, thanks.”

i parked, took my kit bag from the boot of the car and walked towards the 52 seater team bus parked outside the ice rink.

i did not know any of the a team players, as b team players didn’t mix with the a team, so i had a mix of nerves and excitement as i headed towards the bus to pack my bag.

as i looked up there was this huge guy in front of me, with tousled two tone blonde hair and a moustache that made him look scandinavian.

“alright, i’m moose.”

“alright, i’m jeff.”

and he helped me load my bag into the coach.

the rest, as they say is history.

i have a feeling mandy was on that bus.

i have run out of time for updates, so until next week,

blue skies,

jeff

p.s. chloe and crawf are recovering extremely well, and sydney is becoming a much loved member of the family.