Meant to post this to the list a couple days ago, for reasons which will
become obvious...

The following was first posted to HOCKEY-L back in February of 1991 by
James Love, and it became somewhat of an annual tradition thereafter.  It
hasn't made it to the list the last few years, but with HOCKEY-L in its
fifteenth year, I thought it was time to give this post another run.  For
those of you who haven't seen this -- enjoy!  And for those of you who
have, revisit an old classic.  Herewith, the HOCKEY-L "Ode to Joy":

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     For many years the Boston "Phoenix" would publish a special
section
on/around St. Valentine's Day that chronicled reader testimonials
of Cupid's
hits and misses.  The following excerpt appeared a few years
ago, and was
sent to me by a Boston acquaintance who met his future bride
at a college
hockey game, and who still plan their social calendar around
the UNH icemen.
I meant to post this last week, but ....  Oh, well - the
passion of the
playoffs is soon upon us, so it's still most timely.  I
think we all know
people (of both sexes) who could have written the
following:

     "I blame it all on a goddamn college hockey game.  Oh,
sure, you're
thinking, maybe I should blame myself.  Well, the hell with
all of you.
      The light of my life, she was - or so I'd convinced
myself over the
space of the three weeks we'd been taking the same
political history course.
Our eyes met during a lecture on Grover
Cleveland, and I was hooked.  I
asked her out for a beer after class; she
mentioned that she had an extra
ticket to that night's game against St.
Lawrence.  At the time, I understood
less about hockey than I did about
Grover Cleveland, but so what ??  I would
be with HER.
      That night, I
learned that the St. Lawrence icemen are known to one
and all as the
'Larries'; for all I knew, there could have been a bunch of
Moes and
Curleys down there too.  The problem was .... *she* knew.  Worse
yet, she
cared.  And she was appalled that I didn't.  Which is why she then
launched
into a lengthy and aggressively condescending discourse on the
subtle
differences between cross-checking, spearing, and aggravated
assault,
intermittently punctuated by her emphatic observation that the
referee was,
as she put it, a 'blind motherf**ker.'  All hope vanished at
the moment she
realized that I didn't count Snooks Kelley as one of the
five greatest
inspirations of my life; her lips were silent, but her eyes
said 'wimp city.'
      Dreams die hard - but none so hard as those
shattered by a bunch of
hyperthyroidal Canadians with knives on their feet
and sticks in their hands.
Goddamn college hockey game.  Maybe I'll become
a priest ...."

     Well, *I'd* sure like to meet her .... !!   Cheers,
Jim

Jim Love
UNH '79, '85G

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--
Bill Fenwick                                                 DJF   5/27/94
Cornell '86 and '95                                          JCF   12/2/97
LET'S GO RED!!