zenzalei

Tonight’s entry is inspired by Mary over at Red Nose, a devout hockey and Washington Capitals fan.

I love hockey, too. One of my first memories, if not the first memory I had, is of my father sitting on the edge of my parents’ bed listening to a game on the radio.

“What are you doing, Daddy?”

“I’m listening to the Rangers game.”

“What’s a Rangers game?”

And the rest was history. My father was a Rangers fan until Long Island got its own hockey team, the Islanders. Then he switched. He used to love the “grudge matches” between the Rangers and the Islanders, which, admittedly, have always been pretty intense, even rather bloody at times. I grew up an Islanders fan, as the team’s first season was 1972-1973, when I was six years old, and enjoyed the fun of being in high school for most of the Islanders Stanley Cup Dynasty.

Then in the 1990s, after I decided to make the D.C. area my home, I decided to adopt a local team, and so I adopted the Capitals. I had season tickets in the 1997-1998 season, when they went all the way to the Stanley Cup finals only to be swept by the Detroit Red Wings (still can’t stand ’em). That season coincided with my Year Off from Men, and I traveled with friends to see the Caps play in a whole bunch of different cities, including in western Canada in Edmonton, Calgary, and Vancouver. I went full die-hard, actually.

My parents were not pleased. In fact, when I went home to visit one Christmas, there was a sign on the front door in my mother’s handwriting: “This entrance for Islanders fans only. All others use rear door.”

AND SHE MADE ME DO IT, TOO. I remember my father telling me “You’re lucky we didn’t change the locks. I had to talk her out of it.”

“Don’t worry, I still love the Mets.”

Wrong thing to say, as my family was a house divided on that, with my father a Mets fan and my mother a Yankees fan. And my father called me out on that, too. “You can’t pick a Washington baseball team because they don’t have one.” (The Nationals came back to D.C. in 2005. And, um, well, I adopted them, too, but my parents were both gone by that point.)

“Okay, the Jets. I will always love the Jets.”

At least I stayed true to my word on that, bag over my head and all—yes, we still do that—because they haven’t won a Super Bowl since I was two years old. I am now 58, so do the math.

I’m willing to bet the guy next to him with his eyes shut is a Jets fan, too. The expression says it all.

But I will never—and I mean NEVER—be a fan of the D.C. football team. I never liked the name “Redskins,” but “Commanders?” What kind of tone-deaf Handmaid’s Tale toxic masculinity crap is that? NO, don’t tell me it refers to the military. D.C. is one of the most well-read and liberal cities in the country, and The Handmaid’s Tale TV series was in its white-knuckling fifth season when the new name took effect. Whoever made the decision didn’t read the room.

As for hockey, I’m sticking with the Caps. If the Islanders go further in the playoffs than the Caps, I’ll root for them, but my heart rocks the Red, and so here is tonight’s ornament.