"I'm glad I'm not on that team!" exclaimed a cadet to another.
"What team?"
"The hockey team. Didn't you hear?"
"Hear what?"
"They didn't get Winter Break!"
December 25, 2008 was the shortest Christmas I have ever had. In fact it actually lasted one hour shorter than timely possibly. I had the unique, but unfortunate opportunity to celebrate Christmas for only 23 hours.
How is this possible you may ask? It's quite simple actually. At 10 A.M. on Christmas morning I hopped on a plane at the Minneapolis-Saint Paul Airport destined for New York. Along the way I crossed an imaginary line demarcating the Central and Eastern time zones. An hour of Christmas Day evaporated as quickly as Santa disappears up the chimney. That inconvenient time change had shortened one of my favorite holidays. I was being summoned back to West Point, along with my teammates, for a Christmas evening practice.
Winter Leave, as we call it here at West Point, comes with great anticipation every year for the Corps of Cadets. A semester's worth of work is nearly complete and the comfy confines of home loom in the not so far off future. Restless anticipation sifts through the barracks during finals week - a week filled with tests of unfathomable lengths and tortuous study sessions. These are the last obstacles to hurdle prior to going home. Time moves slower than a tortoise. The week is endless.
But finals week finally ended and winter leave began. However, for the hockey team, winter leave ends nearly as soon as it begins.
On Christmas Day (Christmas Eve for the West Coasters) all twenty-nine members of the Army Hockey team come back to West Point to prepare for holiday tournaments. One would suspect everyone to be filled with 'Grinch like' scorn because someone had literally just stolen their Christmas. And in fact I must admit that that suspicion is nearly correct, but not completely.
It is certainly difficult to be away from family during the holidays, knowing that they are all gathered around the fireplace unwrapping gifts and drinking delicious seasonal drinks. All the while you are cramped in seat B45, knees to chest, elbows tucked in and still two and half hours away from your destination. It is easy to brood about the cruelty Christmas Day has inflicted upon you. After all, it is that perceived cruelty that provoked a cadet into denouncing anyone's participation on the hockey team. Why would anyone want to forgo their winter leave to play hockey? Are they ludicrous?
Yes, that is quite possible.
Playing college hockey, though a dream come true for all who play, comes with its sacrifices. It's the longest season of all college sports spanning seven to eight months. The season encompasses Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukah, New Years and often Spring Break. Nobody is forced to play the sport, but all of us would be crazy to give it up. For most of us it's something we've been doing our entire lives. College hockey is the culmination of years and years of work (not to mention years and years of our parents' time and money). Sacrificing a few breaks, winter break included, is in our eyes a small sacrifice in the big scheme of things. My teammates and I have sacrificed many 'breaks' to play hockey. Most college students live for these breaks. They go careening off to Cancun, Jamaica or maybe hit the slopes in Aspen or Vail. We play hockey.
We play hockey for one reason: to be with our teammates and friends playing the sport we love. I find that what you are doing is far less important and meaningful than who you are doing it with. There may have been more fun things I could have done over winter break than practice hockey, but there is not a group of guys I'd rather do something with than my teammates. Hockey players are a strange breed. We do things that most others would view as irrational (like giving up winter break). But it is in that strangeness that we bond together - a bond that allows us to have a good time wherever, whenever.
As Christmas Day wore on into its wee hours and the Army Hockey team huddled at center ice, laughing and enjoying each others presence, I couldn't help but think I'm glad I'm on the Army Hockey team!
Thanks for reading,
Go Army!
#7
"What team?"
"The hockey team. Didn't you hear?"
"Hear what?"
"They didn't get Winter Break!"
December 25, 2008 was the shortest Christmas I have ever had. In fact it actually lasted one hour shorter than timely possibly. I had the unique, but unfortunate opportunity to celebrate Christmas for only 23 hours.
How is this possible you may ask? It's quite simple actually. At 10 A.M. on Christmas morning I hopped on a plane at the Minneapolis-Saint Paul Airport destined for New York. Along the way I crossed an imaginary line demarcating the Central and Eastern time zones. An hour of Christmas Day evaporated as quickly as Santa disappears up the chimney. That inconvenient time change had shortened one of my favorite holidays. I was being summoned back to West Point, along with my teammates, for a Christmas evening practice.
Winter Leave, as we call it here at West Point, comes with great anticipation every year for the Corps of Cadets. A semester's worth of work is nearly complete and the comfy confines of home loom in the not so far off future. Restless anticipation sifts through the barracks during finals week - a week filled with tests of unfathomable lengths and tortuous study sessions. These are the last obstacles to hurdle prior to going home. Time moves slower than a tortoise. The week is endless.
But finals week finally ended and winter leave began. However, for the hockey team, winter leave ends nearly as soon as it begins.
On Christmas Day (Christmas Eve for the West Coasters) all twenty-nine members of the Army Hockey team come back to West Point to prepare for holiday tournaments. One would suspect everyone to be filled with 'Grinch like' scorn because someone had literally just stolen their Christmas. And in fact I must admit that that suspicion is nearly correct, but not completely.
It is certainly difficult to be away from family during the holidays, knowing that they are all gathered around the fireplace unwrapping gifts and drinking delicious seasonal drinks. All the while you are cramped in seat B45, knees to chest, elbows tucked in and still two and half hours away from your destination. It is easy to brood about the cruelty Christmas Day has inflicted upon you. After all, it is that perceived cruelty that provoked a cadet into denouncing anyone's participation on the hockey team. Why would anyone want to forgo their winter leave to play hockey? Are they ludicrous?
Yes, that is quite possible.
Playing college hockey, though a dream come true for all who play, comes with its sacrifices. It's the longest season of all college sports spanning seven to eight months. The season encompasses Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukah, New Years and often Spring Break. Nobody is forced to play the sport, but all of us would be crazy to give it up. For most of us it's something we've been doing our entire lives. College hockey is the culmination of years and years of work (not to mention years and years of our parents' time and money). Sacrificing a few breaks, winter break included, is in our eyes a small sacrifice in the big scheme of things. My teammates and I have sacrificed many 'breaks' to play hockey. Most college students live for these breaks. They go careening off to Cancun, Jamaica or maybe hit the slopes in Aspen or Vail. We play hockey.
We play hockey for one reason: to be with our teammates and friends playing the sport we love. I find that what you are doing is far less important and meaningful than who you are doing it with. There may have been more fun things I could have done over winter break than practice hockey, but there is not a group of guys I'd rather do something with than my teammates. Hockey players are a strange breed. We do things that most others would view as irrational (like giving up winter break). But it is in that strangeness that we bond together - a bond that allows us to have a good time wherever, whenever.
As Christmas Day wore on into its wee hours and the Army Hockey team huddled at center ice, laughing and enjoying each others presence, I couldn't help but think I'm glad I'm on the Army Hockey team!
Thanks for reading,
Go Army!
#7
Great job against Miami...you guys must of had some good practices. I've been a fan of Army Hockey since the days David Merhar (Ely, MN) and Tony Curran (International Falls, MN) formed one of the greatest line combinations in college hockey history at Army...probably 1965 - 1969. However, I'm a North Dakota Fighting Sioux fan.
Practice on Christmas Day--that's dedication! All the hard work you guys have been doing definitely shows--y'all have been putting on some exciting games!
Go Army! :)