Penguins training camp
So on Friday Myles and I spent some quality
Mother-Son time (as opposed to our low-quality time we spent together the other 22 hours on Friday) at Penguins training camp. For those of you that were looking forward (hahaha) to my Steelers training camp follow-up post back in August, chalk it up to another casualty of my move. Yeah, I move to Pittsburgh and MISS Steelers training camp. Figure THAT one out.
I heard that the Penguins have open practices for their first week of pre-season training before they close them to the public. Unfortunately, the open practices are during the school day, so I couldn't bring Crispian, who would have provided this blogger with a lot of great lines and analysis.
So I told Myles that we would be going to see hockey, and he would say, "Hockey hockey" but it was meaningless to him until we got into Mellon arena and the game as part of the training camp tournament was already underway. This picture immediately below was his expression for almost 45 minutes with the occasional glance up to me with a huge smile of disbelief.
He was mesmerized by the sport. I know how he feels. Sometimes when I am watching alive hockey game I get so hypnotized with all the skating and sticks flying.
As luck would have it, we did get to see Sidney Crosby skate in the training camp tournament. The crowd of a few hundred was very excited every time he got the puck. While we were there, he only had one assist and one missed penalty shot, but other than that some great skating. Crosby wore #12 in the tournament and is in the rather grainy picture above. We also saw John LeClair, which was pretty exciting, too. The best excitement in the game we saw came from the goal tenders, Marc-Andre Fleury and Jocelyn Tibault.
So after the game was done, I asked Myles if he liked hockey.
So I bought him a souvenir hockey stick set, and he couldn't wait to play with it.
It was one of those days that you hear about on the profiles on, like, ESPN.
There I am, 50 some years old, at first just a voice-over saying, "The very first time he saw hockey played live was at a Pittsburgh Penguins training camp when he was two. The minute we walked into the arena, he had this look on his face like there was something magic going on down there on the ice." All this time they are showing clips of his youth hockey career, like photos, newspaper clippings, maybe even some home video.
Fade to me, going through my scrap book in front of his trophies and professionally framed jerseys from high school and college (Boston College?). I would talk about this learning to skate and sacrifices along the way towards his great hockey career, like a senior prom forgone for the Junior B Cup finals. He wouldn't be the natural talent like Sidney Crosby, but that player that is all heart, like Ron Francis, and he'll win the Lady Byng Trophy......
OR
Another, funnier scenario would be the voice over, the photos, but then the announcer says, "It appears that for Myles, a successful career in hockey was almost predestined. Until he moved with his family to China at the age of three, where there was no hockey, but he picked up instead his new love, an unlikely love, Ping Pong. Having trained with the best of them, he is now poised to be the first American to win an Olympic Gold Medal in table tennis."
Mother-Son time (as opposed to our low-quality time we spent together the other 22 hours on Friday) at Penguins training camp. For those of you that were looking forward (hahaha) to my Steelers training camp follow-up post back in August, chalk it up to another casualty of my move. Yeah, I move to Pittsburgh and MISS Steelers training camp. Figure THAT one out.
I heard that the Penguins have open practices for their first week of pre-season training before they close them to the public. Unfortunately, the open practices are during the school day, so I couldn't bring Crispian, who would have provided this blogger with a lot of great lines and analysis.
So I told Myles that we would be going to see hockey, and he would say, "Hockey hockey" but it was meaningless to him until we got into Mellon arena and the game as part of the training camp tournament was already underway. This picture immediately below was his expression for almost 45 minutes with the occasional glance up to me with a huge smile of disbelief.
He was mesmerized by the sport. I know how he feels. Sometimes when I am watching alive hockey game I get so hypnotized with all the skating and sticks flying.As luck would have it, we did get to see Sidney Crosby skate in the training camp tournament. The crowd of a few hundred was very excited every time he got the puck. While we were there, he only had one assist and one missed penalty shot, but other than that some great skating. Crosby wore #12 in the tournament and is in the rather grainy picture above. We also saw John LeClair, which was pretty exciting, too. The best excitement in the game we saw came from the goal tenders, Marc-Andre Fleury and Jocelyn Tibault.
So after the game was done, I asked Myles if he liked hockey.
So I bought him a souvenir hockey stick set, and he couldn't wait to play with it.
It was one of those days that you hear about on the profiles on, like, ESPN.
There I am, 50 some years old, at first just a voice-over saying, "The very first time he saw hockey played live was at a Pittsburgh Penguins training camp when he was two. The minute we walked into the arena, he had this look on his face like there was something magic going on down there on the ice." All this time they are showing clips of his youth hockey career, like photos, newspaper clippings, maybe even some home video.
Fade to me, going through my scrap book in front of his trophies and professionally framed jerseys from high school and college (Boston College?). I would talk about this learning to skate and sacrifices along the way towards his great hockey career, like a senior prom forgone for the Junior B Cup finals. He wouldn't be the natural talent like Sidney Crosby, but that player that is all heart, like Ron Francis, and he'll win the Lady Byng Trophy......
OR
Another, funnier scenario would be the voice over, the photos, but then the announcer says, "It appears that for Myles, a successful career in hockey was almost predestined. Until he moved with his family to China at the age of three, where there was no hockey, but he picked up instead his new love, an unlikely love, Ping Pong. Having trained with the best of them, he is now poised to be the first American to win an Olympic Gold Medal in table tennis."
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