My Magic Stick - UPDATE
A while back, I told some of you about
my magic stick. It enabled me to score like the dickens, and pretty much made me a hero in my hockey league. It had an IGINLA curve. My wrist shot was so hard that diamonds were jealous, and the arena glass would hold its breath every time I wound up a slapper. I had 364 goals, 417 assists in 113 games with my magic stick. Before that, I had 4 goals and 6 assists in 17 games. My team had won 78 games in a row (although we somehow lost the league championship in the midst of that streak). I think it's safe to say that the stick improved my game quite a bit.
There is no easy way to say this, friends. I come to you with horrible news. Last night, I experienced the worst tragedy of my life (to put it in context, my family was eaten by rhinos in front of me when I was eight years old). I was playing in my local league when the unthinkable happened. Allow me to share with you. I must warn you: the rest of this may be hard for some to read. The faint of heart may want to turn back now. You have been warned. Brace yourselves.
Last night, I was lighting it up like an Olympic flame cast in a sea of Luongos, as I usually do. My magic stick was nestled comfortably in my mighty hands, which poets have described as "the granite gauntlets of the gods", and I had already potted something like 5 goals and maybe 3 assists. My hair flowed playfully in the breeze as I worked my way past enemy players. None could touch me, and few dared to try.
Late in the second period, I picked up the puck in my zone and began one of my regular journeys down the ice. At centre, one of the opposing players challenged me. With a deft touch, I poked the puck between the legs of the lanky awkward-gaited fellow, spun by him in a glorious pirouette, and cradled the puck in my magic stick's IGINLA curve on his other side. I faintly heard the other player thank me as I flew by. That happens quite a bit. They are proud to have had the opportunity.
I blew past the blue line like a freight train with a purpose toward the opposition's goal. My gaze locked with that of the goalie. I could smell the fear rising from him like a stinking black cloud as I saw his eyes widen and the sweat bead on his brow. He knew the deal. He was but a technicality before I whipped another wrister top-shelf. I drew the puck back and wound up my wrist shot. Top right corner sounded right to me. I had it labelled and the world was my oyster. Daddy was home, and he had brought the bacon. The helpless goalie flinched as he anticipated what was to come. The puck would not even touch him... if he was lucky. Several had tried to block one of my shots. Few had survived.
I leaned into the shot, and that's when the unthinkable happened. As I put pressure on my stick, something just felt
off. As I leaned into the shot, I felt the most sickening feeling I have ever experienced. The bend was wrong. There was too much give in the stick. And then I heard the noise.
The snap. The cracking sound that signaled the end of an era.
I do not exaggerate when I say that the sound (and the feeling) of my magic stick breaking was the worst thing I have ever experienced. Keep in mind that I once witnessed a man who was so hungry, he took up a dare to eat his own arm in exchange for a sandwich. (Ironic twist: after eating his arm, he was no longer hungry for the sandwich.) This was far worse than that. I felt the stick snap and then I fell. Time seemed to stand still, and for several seconds I didn't know what was happening. None of it sunk in. As I slid slowly across the ice on my knees, I held up my hands and saw the stick was split in twain. My magic stick was shattered, and with it, my hopes, my dreams, and my world. I let out "the most soul-wrenching, animalistic scream ever uttered by the throat of man". At least according to Jimmy.
That was when it sank in: my magic stick was no more. The magic was gone. My days of utter dominance in my local hockey league were through. Not only had my stick broken, but so had my mind.
The next few hours are a blur. I am told that I was forceably removed from the ice after trying to stab the goalie with the shards of my shattered stick. I was supposedly going for the heart as "that's where the foul creature keeps its humors", or so I loudly claimed. Apparently I chased him around the net about six times, and everyone just stared in silence, too stunned to react. Then the refs dragged me away from the remnants of my stick, with me bellowing foul curses of vengeance all the while. I managed to get away from the refs after the first attempt and went at the goalie again after recovering a portion of my stick. I know the goalie had little (if anything) to do with the stick breaking, but I was in a blind rage by this point. While I am less than proud, my actions must be taken in context. I struggled out of the grip of the refs a second time, and fled into the night, weeping openly.
I was found later in a neighboring arena, dressed only in a Snuggie and apparently trying to organize what I referred to as "a grand battle between polar bears and penguins to determine polar supremacy once and for all". How I found two polar bears and six penguins at that hour and how I got them all on the ice in position for the battle is a mystery to me and the police alike. Fortunately, I was stopped before the battle could begin. My money would have likely been on the bears, but as Polar Emperor I really shouldn't take sides.
When I awoke this morning, everything was different. I now see the world in the same drab colors as the rest of you mere mortals. My heart sinks to know I will never again see what I called ultra-tangerine and para-green. The glowing auras I used to see around people and particularly intelligent pets are gone, and I can no longer see into the future. I tried shooting a puck today with a different stick and it was like pushing a soggy baby across sandpaper with a shuffleboard tang: mildly amusing, yet ultimately pointless. I suspect my point production will suffer in future as a result.
I admit I feel lost now. I am not sure if I will be posting much here in the future, especially with all the upcoming court dates arising from my actions last night. I just thought I owed it to you people to at least let you know that my magic stick is no more. Goodbye, magic stick. You made me more than just a man.
I will maybe see if they have another magic stick at the store, but I'm sure they would have sold it by now. I will miss my magic stick. At least now I know how Gretzky felt when his enchanted medallion got sucked into that time vortex.
P.S. Did you guys know there was a lockout in the NHL?!