Aldershot Ball Hockey

A great hockey man once said “Hockey is a man’s game. The team with the most real men wins”. Every Sunday a team of real men come together to play Canada’s game, they call themselves the Aldershot Ball Hockey (ABH) group. The ABH was enacted by a small group of childhood friends whose passion for hockey has only intensified over the years. ABH started playing hockey ten years ago in a plowed public school parking lot throughout the cold winter months. As the group grew, both in age and in numbers, we outgrew our initial meeting spot and were forced to find a larger one which could better accommodate our 4 on 4 hockey games. After a somewhat cumbersome search, we found “The Spot”, a set of local public tennis courts in Leighland Park. Some would call it a tennis court, but sorry to all those with rackets in your hands, tennis is cancelled on Sundays. The long Canadian winter, typically plagued by numerous snowfalls, meant that we would have to shovel “The Spot” for each and every game, sometimes even requiring an intermission to resurface the playing field on stormy days. However this has been and will always be a small price to pay to play Canada’s greatest game, that of hockey. “The Spot”, also known as home every Sunday afternoon, no matter what the weather conditions are, be it at a 35°C summer heat wave or a -15°C winter storm; it has become a staple of our weekly routines. Relocating to our new “spot” was a daunting task to say the least and required us to shuttle our nets on top of our cars, significantly damaging our paint jobs. Yet our journey was nowhere near over. The Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games Gold Medal Hockey game was scheduled during our regular Sunday afternoon time slot. Dedicated as we are, we began our game two hours early and played up until the drop of the puck, as die-hard hockey fans would. ABH personifies the Canadian passion and love for the game of hockey. Our sportsmanship and passion extends far beyond the game itself but also to our local community. Recently, two younger kids, who seemingly had been watching us play for weeks, showed up with their sticks, asking to play. Surely we could not refuse them as they too shared our passion and love of the game. They were placed on a team and the afternoon continued on as if we’d play with them for years. Afterward their mother approached us and expressed her gratitude for having had included her sons. She even went insofar to invite us over for post game hamburgers. This was not the first act of kindness that has been demonstrated by the local community towards us. Another friendly elderly citizen who lives nearby and has watched us play on several occasions, graciously allows us to store our nets in her garage to avoid having to transport them to “The Spot” each week. In return for her kind gesture, we are always sure to shovel her driveway throughout the winter, as she would surely struggle to do so. In addition, a tradition of giving her cards and flowers has been started for holidays such as Christmas and Mothers Day. ABH surely personifies what it takes to be a Canadian hockey lover through our passion, heart, sportsmanship and sheer love of the game. Despite all these traits, we still lack one key component, the Stanley Cup. - ABH