The Meaning of Hockey, Chapter 29

Billy Weldon picked up his third straight shutout, 5-0 against the Medicine Hat Tigers. Vicente had a goal and two assists, the first time in his junior career that he was credited with more assists than goals. Buckinghorse had two goals, both spectacular end-to-end rushes that even had the Medicine Hat crowd on its feet in applause afterwards. Lalli had a goal and no penalty minutes. Mike Webster had fought and beaten the toughest player in the Tiger line-up. Matt Hollingsworth had agreed to join the team in three days, when they played in Regina. And after the game Weldon and his father talked, then told Bobby that Billy had decided to join the team permanently. Everything about the Totems had come together just as Bobby hoped. The team needed one more good playmaker like his son, a defenceman and a couple of fourth-line forwards, whom he hoped to pick up by holding a camp for unlisted players back in Vancouver.

***

Some of the players were asleep within five minutes of climbing back on board the bus, the result of physical tiredness combined with emotional contentment. Bobby had extra helpings of one but not enough of the other.

He decided to talk to Max, the team bus driver and trainer. Mad Max, the players called him. Max was older than Bobby and claimed to have been an ambulance driver, first in the American army in Vietnam, then in New York and finally in Regina before becoming a bus-driving trainer for various teams in the Western Hockey League over the past decade. Max knew where he was going in every small town and city from Winnipeg to Victoria and the states of Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Montana. Plus, he was one of the best thread-em-up-fast cut men Bobby had ever run across. Max could sew up a 10-stitch gash in less than two minutes. And the work would be better than that performed in most major hospital emergency rooms.

When he had first been told this about Max before hiring him, Bobby thought it was hyperbole, but after last night who could doubt his fine work. Alphonse Picard had been clipped by a stick on his cheek early in the first period and Max gave him thirteen stitches to close the wound. The entire procedure, from the time the defenceman arrived at the bench until he was ready to hop the boards and return to the ice was 116 seconds. Bo, the assistant trainer and equipment manager, had timed it. And when Bobby looked at the wound between periods, it was clear that Max was better at closing a wound than most surgeons.

“That was good work you did on Picard last night,” said Bobby as he road shotgun at the front of the bus.

“Not bad, but I know I can get faster,” said Max as he drove down the almost deserted two-lane Saskatchewan section of Highway One between Medicine Hat and Maple Creek.

“How the hell you learn to do that?” said Bobby.

“Stay calm and work fast, I learned that in Vietnam and New York,” said Max. “Stitches themselves, I learned that by doing embroidery.”

“Embroidery?” said Bobby. “That’s interesting. Used to play with a goalie, Jacques Lecavalier, who did that. Really nervous type before games and he hated flying. He used to embroider to take his mind off pucks and dying in plane crashes.”

“I can understand that,” said Max. “It’s very relaxing.”

“In the airport lounge, in the dressing room, Jacques would take out his embroidery and he wouldn’t pay attention to anything else.”

“Smooths you out, calms you down and increases your focus. I can see it would be good for a goalie.”

“Jacques certainly needed calming down and smoothing out,” said Bobby as he smiled, remembering something about his old teammate.

“One time this rookie — a hot shot, forget the guy’s name, never amounted to anything — snuck into Jacques’ embroidery case. He carried the stuff in a black leather attaché case. Made him look like an insurance salesman. Anyhow, this rookie got into the attaché case when Jacques went to the bathroom and dulled all the needles by tapping them on a cement wall in the airport lounge. Jacques comes back from the bathroom and pulls out his embroidery and within five seconds he knows something is wrong. Idiot kid starts laughing and Jacques glares at him. Next thing we know the kid is wearing all of those wooden embroidery frames around his neck.”

Bobby laughed out loud.

“Wooden Neck, that’s what we called that kid the entire time he was with us.”

Max did not find the story funny.

“Dull needles are no joke,” he said, after listening to Bobby laugh for a few seconds.

Bobby stopped laughing.

“Dull needles cause you to hurt yourself or someone else,” said Max.

“That’s certainly the way Jacques felt about it,” said Bobby.

“I hate dull needles,” said Max.

Bobby did not know how to respond, so he simply sat there, staring out the windshield at a road that disappeared in darkness a few hundred feet ahead of them. The sensation of staring into a barely lit sea of darkness quickly made Bobby feel contemplative. After a few moments he spoke again, hoping the subject of dull needles had been forgotten.

“You ever think about the meaning of life?” said Bobby. “Driving and looking out the windshield with the sky like that, so huge. Doesn’t it make you think about how insignificant we are? Human beings, the earth, hockey? It’s all pretty much meaningless compared with the cosmos, don’t you think?”

Max stared straight ahead, as if he hadn’t heard Bobby’s words.

“We’re insignificant particles on a trivial speck that is a tiny part of a small blur in the universe,” continued Bobby.

The hum of tires riding the pavement and Troy’s snoring were the only sounds as the two men thought about life.

Finally, Max spoke. “Ya, but we skate much better than the Klingons.”

Bobby smiled. Mad Max had a sense of humor.

But enjoyment of the joke only lasted a few seconds before Bobby was back in a funk. He just couldn’t shake the feeling that there had to be more of a reason for existence.

“What do you believe Max?” said Bobby.

“About what?” said Max.

“What’s your philosophy of life? Are you religious? Political? How do you describe yourself?”

Max did not answer immediately. Perhaps he was thinking about what to say, but Bobby felt impatient.

“What’s the point of living? I mean you need a philosophy to answer that question, right? You need a point of view in order to understand life, right? I’ve been too busy playing hockey all these years to ever stop and think and now I can hardly contemplate anything else.”

Max still didn’t answer.

“I have a girlfriend or at least someone who I’d like to be my girlfriend and she asks me this question, ‘what do you believe in?’ and I can’t answer. So I start to wonder if I’m some kind of freak. Can most people answer this question? Am I weird?” said Bobby. “What do you think?”

“I think we’re all weird,” said Max. “The world is weird.”

“That’s your philosophy?” said Bobby. “We’re all weird?”

“Pretty much,” said Max.

Bobby considered this for a few seconds. “What would you call this philosophy?”

“After I came back from Vietnam and I was working in New York as an ambulance driver, I spent a lot of time, maybe a couple of years, trying to figure out what I believed,” said Max.

He spoke much too slowly for Bobby. “And what did you conclude?”

“I concluded that spending a lot of time on figuring out what I believed was one way to spend my time. But after a while it gets kind of boring, unless you can make a living writing philosophy books or something.”

“That’s it?” said Bobby. “That was the extent of your insight?”

“No,” said Max. “I concluded that if I was anything, I was nihilist.”

“A nihilist?” said Bobby.

“I don’t believe in anything.”

“Believing in nothing is something?” said Bobby.

“Believing in nothing is nihilism,” said Max. “Which I don’t believe in because I’m a nihilist.”

“That’s clever,” said Bobby. “I like that.”

“Life has no point,” said Max. “That is the point.”

“Interesting,” said Bobby.

“The nineteenth-century Russian nihilists believed society was so messed up that you had to destroy everything before you could build a better world,” said Max. “That’s kind of how I felt after Vietnam.”

“I could see that,” said Bobby. “It’s kind of how I feel now, after 35 years in hockey.”

Max turned to look at Bobby for the first time in their conversation. It was a quick glance, but Bobby recognized it as concern from someone who cared. He wondered why all these people seemed to worry about him.

“I think I’m a more sophisticated nihilist now,” said Max. “I don’t trust any one philosophy or religion or political view. I don’t want to box myself in. I’m not angry about things like I used to be.”

“Maybe it’s the embroidery,” said Bobby.

Max smiled. “Probably is.”

“Driving this bus, especially on these long hauls at night, you’ve got a lot of time to think, cause most times everyone is sleeping,” said Max.

“Am I bothering you?” said Bobby.

“No,” said Max. “Not at all. I’ve just been watching the last two months, since I started working for you, and you seem … bothered.”

“You got that right,” said Bobby.

“You probably don’t think someone like me would have much to say to someone like you on this subject,” said Max.

Bobby interrupted. “I’ll take good advice anywhere I can get it.”

“I’ve been through what you’re going through,” said Max. “Without even knowing the details, because they’re always different, I see myself seven, eight years ago. Mid-life crisis. You wake up one day and you look around and you say to yourself, ‘is that it?’ Is that all there is? One day you go from ‘I plan on doing that when I grow up’ to ‘I’m all grown up and what the fuck have I accomplished?’”

Bobby nodded.

“Life’s a bitch and then you die,” said Max. “Had a friend who used to say that all the time.”

Bobby nodded again.

“But it isn’t true,” said Max. “Or at least it doesn’t have to be. The truth is, most of us in this country and maybe even in most countries, get to choose whether or not life’s a bitch. I mean, if you’re clinically depressed, you don’t have a choice, but for the rest of us, we have some say about how we interpret the world.”

“You think so?” said Bobby.

“I know so,” said Max. “I’m not going to sit here and tell you, like some people, that we can do whatever we want in our lives. That isn’t how it works for most of us. Some of us get very limited choices and some of us get more — that’s about as far as I’m willing to argue. And maybe it’s all fate. Maybe if we knew everything there was to know about physics and chemistry and time and had an incredibly powerful computer, maybe we could predict what will happen to every single person, once they’re born. Maybe everything that happens to us is going to happen and we just have the illusion of free will, I don’t know. But I do know that we get some leeway, most of us, in how we react. We can get angry, mad, depressed or we can say ‘so what, tomorrow is another day.’ We can roll with the punches or keep stepping into them.”

“You have to believe there is some point to the fight before you can roll with the punches or why not just stop fighting?” said Bobby.

“What’s the point of sleeping or eating? What’s the point of sitting around with friends, bullshitting? What’s the point of playing hockey? What’s the point of working? What’s the point of thinking about what the point is? The point is whatever you want it to be,” said Max. “There is no meaning to life other than what we give it.”

Bobby sighed.

“You think Mother Nature cares whether or not you or I are alive?” said Max. “You were right when you said how big the universe is and how insignificant we are. One human being, a million human beings, if you look at us from the point of view of the universe, we are right next door to utterly meaningless. The entire Western Hockey League could disappear and you think it would matter to the eight million people in Lima, Peru? You think another planet in our solar system would even notice?”

“Nice of you to cheer me up,” said Bobby.

“Go to war and then you’ll see exactly how important our lives are, even to other human beings,” said Max.

“So what’s your point?” said Bobby. “I should feel better because my life is totally insignificant.”

“My point is, searching for the meaning of life somewhere out there is not where you’ll find contentment. You want to find meaning out there in the cosmos then believe in a god. Then you have meaning. God cares and so you are significant.”

“I see no evidence of a god,” said Bobby. “I mean, religious people say god gives meaning to the world. God created the world. But then who created god? They say ‘god is.’ But how the hell is that anymore meaningful than believing the Big Bang created the world. The Big Bang is.”

Bobby shook his head as he thought about his beliefs. “I was brought up with god, but it doesn’t make sense to me anymore.”

“Me neither, but that’s not the point,” said Max. “I believe we make god in our image and then turn around and say he made us in his image. But that’s cool. If you can believe that and it helps you get through the day, why the hell should I complain?”

“But what if you can’t believe?” said Bobby.

“Well, then instead of inventing a god to give your life meaning you just shorten the process and invent meaning directly. Instead of believing god tells you to do good works, just believe in doing good works. Instead of believing god tells you not to kill, believe we’re all better off in the absence of murder. Instead of believing the point of life is trying to serve god, believe the point of life is trying to be content,” said Max. “Most religions and philosophies were just a way to enforce a code of conduct that made society work better, that’s what I believe..”

“Sounds kind of cynical,” said Bobby.

“Not cynical, practical,” said Max. “Believe in looking on the bright side. That’s very practical. Believe in treating people right, so there’s a better chance you will be treated right. Practical. Believe in being happy. Practical. Believe in embroidery.”

“That works for you?” said Bobby.

Max nodded.

“Really?” said Bobby.

“I’m content,” said Max. “I enjoy the moment. I make the most of my life as it is. I consciously choose to put low value on accumulations of material goods. I change jobs every so often. I keep myself busy. I’ve got friends I enjoy. What more is there?”

Bobby didn’t quite believe Max.

“I choose to be content.”

“And I could too?” said Bobby.

“I don’t know you well enough to say that,” said Max.

Bobby nodded and thought about the idea of choosing to be content. It was an attractive concept.

The two men remained silent for a long time.

“You want to talk some more?” said Bobby. “To help you keep awake?”

“I’ll talk if you want,” said Max. “But you don’t need to for my sake. I got music I listen to on headphones. I’m going through all of Bessie Smith and some other blues singers. It’s my new hobby.”

“Maybe I can sleep now,” said Bobby.

“Sure,” said Max. “Go ahead. Sweet dreams.

Next Chapter: Monday

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