Here comes the Misery!

This year, the poorly thought out slogan of the Edmonton hockey club is "Here come the Oilers!"  Here they come, alright.  And there they go, straight down.  Down, down.

Pronger kissed this city goodbye and the good times fell asleep.  We wake up every few years to believe that the dream is over, only to see that it's a trick, and the nightmare, it seems, will never, ever end.  Freddie Kruger is real and he lives under your TV.

The team began the tumble down the mountain in 2006.  It rolled down, through FA pickups and the revolving door of gritty something or others.  Joffery Lupul, Peter Sykora, and Eric Cole came and went.  Sheldon Souray was not quite "Oiler" enough.  Dany Heatley just couldn't bring himself to do it.  The list goes on and on.  Band aids on a gushing hemorrhage.

The team rolled all the way down the mountain and passed through the Valley of the Shadow of Death down a dark hole.  And it just keeps on tumbling down into the depths of what just might be H.E. double hockey sticks.

The flames are hot.  The agony seemingly never ending.

Where are we?
What happened?
Game 5.   Pisani.

It truly seems like a dream.  That team had a kid on it named Hemsky, who is now the veteran that everyone is hoping will be traded away for... anything... anything but his no heart attitude.

Kevin Lowe is now a dirty word.  I wonder what he's thinking right now.  When your job is to develop a good hockey team, what goes through your mind when you have not done your job for 7 years?

Tambellini seemed like he was purposely trying to ruin this team into top draft picks.  He took great pride when his shining moment arrived every year for 3 years in a row.  He smiled his sweaty smile and announced to the world how proud he was to select Taylor Hall.  How much of an honour it was for him to select RNH.  How special it was to select the Russian.  What an amazing feeling it was to be the worst team in hockey for almost a decade.  The laughing stock of the league.

The jokes about the Oilers continued on for years until it got boring; boring and sad.  The Oilers have been so bad that making jokes about them seems to be insensitive.  Like joking around with a child, only to have that child unexpectedly cry.  

"Oops, sorry kid.  I didn't mean to make you cry.  Things will turn around.  You've got a good bunch of young players there.  Just stop crying, will ya'?"

Jeff Petry is useless.  He plays 25 minutes a night, but he also makes mistakes, so apparently he's useless.  Lets trade him away so our top pairing can be Ference and Belov.  Now there, my friends, is a pair of #1 guys.  Let's roll with them.  Roll down into Hell.  

"Good riddance, Jeff.  We don't have any other NHL defensemen to play top minutes, so it's your fault."

The Oilers are broken and battered.  It isn't so much that they are this low.  Reality sets in when we realize that we thought "rock bottom" was 3 years ago.  We have talent now, but the results are as bad, if not worse than before.  Have we hit the bottom yet?  Maybe not.

Maybe they'll sign 32 year old Hiller in the off season and re-up the blue line for one more go at it.  If Hiller doesn't work, MacT and the boys will probably scratch their heads and try again with someone with more experience or grit... some goalie with the magical ability to make the defence in front of him play much, much better.

This team, the 2013-2014 Edmonton Oilers will toe-drag/drop pass/coast/drown their way through the rest of their 30 games.  The management might keep things mildly interesting by trading a few people for a few other people.  How many goalies can they dress this year?

This year I paid for Satellite so that I could watch the Oilers.

Even though I swore that I wouldn't give the NHL a dime for a long, long time, I bought my kid a $40 Oiler jersey because he asked for one for Christmas.  My boy is 6.  He's still too young to realize that the Oilers have been horrible his entire life.  I would like him to get into loving hockey, but what kind of messed up message does the Oiler organization serve up to a kid his age?

At his school, the teachers tell the kids to wear their Oilers stuff the day after they win.  I am waiting for the morning where I have to tell Miles that they lost again and he starts crying because he wants to wear his jersey.

It's gone generational now, Oilers.  What can be done?  What can we do with this misery?

My people.

I realized that my hair was thinning when I was in high school.  It's been a long 14 years.  At first I was worried about it.  I was in high school, which seemed too early for me to lose my hair.

At 20 I got married, tricking my wife into marrying me despite the fact that I would never have luscious hair for her to tousle.  I think that she liked me despite that fact.  Maybe it was my sense of humour.

Why do I bring all this up?  Well, I want to be clear that I am comfortable with the way that I look.  I shave what's left like Mr. Clean and go about my day.  My Grandpa was a great man.  My father is a great man.  No big deal.

Now, on with it.

Recently I was hosting at the camp/retreat centre where I work.  I was at the desk when a woman in her 30's came to the desk to ask for the Internet password.  As I double checked the password from a piece of paper behind the desk the woman decided to give me more information.  She said, "Yeah, someone thought they knew it, so they game me a password.  They said that if it didn't work I should ask you.  They said I should ask the Bald Guy."

Now I want to repeat things.  I can be annoyed about this without being upset about being bald.  The reason I am writing this is not to say that I am a sad little bald teddy bear and I want to crawl into a hole with all of the bald people and die.  No, I have a great life, a great family, and pretty great health as well.

I am writing because what's the deal with people pointing out Bald people all of the time?  I know its a very distinguishable feature, but that alone does not seem valid.  Am I supposed to chuckle at her little quip?  Is she including me in the joke?  Does she want the password or not.

Let me make my point:

"They said I should ask the bald guy."

"They said I should ask the guy with the big nose."

"They said I should ask the fat woman."

"They said I should ask the cripple with the crutches."

"They said I should ask the short girl."

"They said I should ask the chunky girl."

"They said I should ask the guy with really bad acne."

"They said I should ask the Asian."

A distinguishable feature is usually something that you shouldn't point out.  Why on Earth is it okay to distinguish bald people in this way?

Why couldn't I have just been "The guy behind the counter"?  The weekend's guest were all women.  It was a women's retreat!  They could have just said "get the password from the guy" period.

It all reminds me of this.

***Language warning***




If there's one thing you can say is that the bald community is pretty easy going when it comes to all of the hate crimes that we suffer through.  Larry and I both rant not because we are insecure with our baldness.  Rarely will we even bring it up.  We won't ask for special parking spots or tax breaks or anything.  We just find it strange that people are able to be so oblivious in situations where they are clearly carrying out such blatant hate crimes.

Thus is the cross that I carry... not being bald, but having to put up with people pointing it out to me all of the time.

My Christmas thought.

Christmas is a lot of things.

We all know about the commercial aspect of it.  We complain, poke and prod it every year.  We criticize it until the criticism it no longer lines up with our shopping sprees.  Our list.  The deals we'll get and the bargains we'll use to justify our role in it all.

Christmas is a rush.  I told Barbara that it felt like Christmas was already over.  I told her this a few weeks ago.  The schedule gets packed pretty tightly on Christmas.  We go out to parties, we plan events, we find baby sitters so that we can participate in celebrating with the people that we know and the people we care about.

Add it all up and you've got New Years breathing down your neck.  It's a hectic pace.  The eating, the drinking.  The late night car rides in the storms.  I feel bloated.  I need to lose weight.  I need to exercise.  Do I get up in the morning or stay up late at night?  Either way, I am exercising in pitch darkness.  I am jogging in freezing temperatures.  I am going over to so and so's house to eat a pile of bird and trimmings.  My 3rd this year.

Christmas is music.  The generic noise of whatever "It's Christmas time" song happens to be playing this hour.  Next hour we're going to hear the same song, but this time it will be Reggae and we'll all have a good laugh because it's funny to imagine all of the fake snow on a beach somewhere.  The sentimental tone of each and every knock-off Christmas song is enough to drive someone insane.  Sort of a Christmas spirit overdose.

And then you hear a song that floats down on you like soft, clean snow.  Making the whole sham new again.  Restoring your hope in authenticity and openness.

Christmas is family.  Family is great.  It's you.  My family is me.  It's acceptance and eating together.  It's kids running around with new things.  Kids fighting over their new toys.  It's just so great and real.

There are plenty other things that go into Christmas, but for now I would like to focus on just one more.

Christmas is something about no fear.  Remember those t-shirts?  We were so tough back then, weren't we?  Not scared of nothin' or nobody.

When I think of it at Christmas time I think of Charlie Brown walking around all worried and depressed.  He gets the directors gig and still he screws it up.  As if a little community play could dig himself out of the ashes.

I can relate to our friend, Charlie.  He's depressed.  He's probably pretty upset that he's so bald, too.  Charlie wants something.  His dog decides to go out and just crush everyone in the Christmas Light contest.  Lucy is making bank at her booth.  Even the smelly kid feels good about himself.  Charlie wants a little bit of what everyone else has.  He wants to fear not.

Then Charlie goes out with Linus to look for a Christmas tree.




The line that gets me.

"This little green one here seems to need a home."

Charlie still fighting the good fight.  Confused, scared, insecure, yet something in him sees the good in Christmas.  Right there in the middle of all that titanium and aluminum.

What will the others say?  What kind of director's decision is this?  Career suicide?

Fear not.  This tree is the one.  This tree will bring everyone together in the end, Charlie Brown.

Later on we hear Linus' speech.  He reads from the Bible.

But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of great joy which will be for all the people.

Linus drops his security blanket and announces that we are not to fear.

Good News, great joy, for all the people.

I think that Christmas means we don't need to be afraid.  We don't need to be afraid of life.  We don't need to be afraid when things shine with the glory of God.  The shepherds' instinct is to be afraid of God?  And the Angel tells them not to fear.  This God, they say.  He need not be feared.

Don't be afraid.  God is good.  This is good news.  Great joy.  For all.

It's right there in the passage.

Jesus is born.  He's going to grow up and teach us new things.  He's going to be the friend of sinners.  He's going to dine with us.  He's going to show us that God is for us.  He is going to be one of us, and he is going to show us that we don't need to be afraid.

I worry about a lot of things.  I am afraid of a lot of things.  I know a lot of people who live in constant fear, and sometimes I can understand why.  We are floating on a rock.  The science of it all makes me nauseous.  Suspended on a string, we are.

And yet, every year we come around to Christmas.  The shopping, the rush, the jingle bells and the families that we share it all with.  How will we pay off the bills this year?  How fat will I get this winter?  What will the future hold?  Which ones will be with us next year and what will become of the ones that are gone?

Fear not.  I bring you good news.  Great Joy.  For all people.