Minnesota Not-so-Nice

We have all heard the stories of over-pumped hockey parents getting into fights over calls made at KID's games. Thankfully, we have been lucky enough to avoid those situations thus far. It is something that I can not comprehend. I guess we are just not competitive enough, because to us, we believe that sports at the kids' level should still be fun. Isn't that why they call match-ups between two teams a 'game'? Just like Candyland, or checkers.....it is a GAME. These are KIDS. We are all suppose to be having a good time.

Tonight, Michael's hockey team had a late night scrimmage against a team from another city. A scrimmage is even more relaxed than a game because it does not count on district rankings. It is basically a fun practice session, except with referees present...the kids really enjoy scrimmages, but they do play as hard as if it were a real game. Towards the very end of the game, one of our guys had quite a bad run-in with an opposing players hockey stick. The handle jammed hard into his stomach and knocked him flat onto the ice, clearly in much pain. Barely a minute passed when some dad from the other team started obnoxiously yelling, "Oh, come on! He's just faking! He's not hurt! Let's go!" After several minutes of this, my husband, natural advocate for children, had had enough. Bob calmly walked over to the guy and said,"Hey, that is really poor form," and politely asked him to stop heckling our injured player, who is just a child after all. Naturally, this did not sit well with Mr.Heckler. He tried intimidating us for the last 2 minutes of the game using threatening stares and body language. He stood at the top of our aisle, as if daring us to walk by. His pride had somehow been injured by my husband's request even though acting like a donkey's behind was apparently perfectly acceptable to him. As we waited for our son to come out of the locker room, his eyes threw daggers at us continuously. I don't know how Bob felt, he stood out of this guy's view path, but I was REALLY nervous. I was sure this crazy, angry-for-nothing man would be waiting for us and our baby in the parking lot with a knife, or gun, or something. The tension in the air felt heavy. This all seemed so ridiculous......I don't get it! Are things like this really so important to get so worked up over? Aren't we adults? What in the world is going on?

Lucky for us, our son is always last out of the locker room. We watched as one by one, our comrades left the building, soon to be leaving us to fend for ourselves alone, 45 minutes away from home, in the middle of nowhere, where no one will hear us scream. Even though Heckler Jr had come out of the locker room 10 minutes prior, Heckler Sr continued to glare at us and wait. We'd never been in a fight before...were we going to make it out alive? Our son continued taking his sweet time, and finally after almost 20 minutes, Mr.Heckler left(maybe because now it was 10:30pm and he had to drive 40 minutes home also). I was still expecting a dangerous meeting outside. But when we finally emerged from the building, the guy was not there. Whew!

I guess we can only be in charge of ourselves and what we do or say. People who are irrational and mentally unstable are going to make decisions in like manner leading to very unpredictable outcomes. It is unfortunate that we have to fear for our own safety in what should be a regular encounter with a fellow human being. But that is the world we presently live in....we are not immune to this, even here in Minnesota.