The timbits beer league

It’s interesting how often life will bring us in a full circle. We are born into this world crying, wrinkly, and fragile. We leave this world sometimes crying, wrinkly and fragile. We start out our lives with a sense of unknowingness. The world is our oyster. We are curious bright eyed beings. We will likely end our final days as whimsical, “all knowing”, old beings.

Somewhere in between our bright eyedness and our whimsied weathered selves, we may have experienced heart ache, failure, and felt real pain. I have come to realize that sometimes our “full circle” happens sooner than anticipated.

I often go out and support a “beer league” hockey team. They are not good as a team. Individually many of them are quite talented. As a team, lacking. I have friends on the team which makes the experience worth while. Also, I have never seen more entertaining hockey, NHL included.

The other night as I sat and watched the team play, guts baring and all, I felt that they reminded me of something. As the game went on I couldn’t quite place what they were reminding me off. It wasn’t until the opposing team scored 3 unanswered goals within a 2 minute span that it hit me. This team plays like Timbits.

Tim Hortons has a sports sponsor program for young kids. Kids from the ages of 4 to 8 can participate in one ice hockey scrimmages. The goal is not to see which team will win or lose, but to have fun. I have seen a few “Timbits” games. They are cute. The mini humans skate their brains out, all chasing the puck. There are no positions, and there is no order. When someone gets the puck, he or she doesn’t stay with it for much time. Before long there is a gaggle of little all stars on skates ready to attack. It’s a good way to keep young kids active in house league sports.

My friends in their beer league are not far off from the young Timbits. A lot of  them have played hockey before. Maybe in elementary school, maybe even in high school. Maybe some of them even thought that they would one day make it big, or at least to OHL. Honestly, I’m not unconvinced that some of them still don’t think that. But the point is, they didn’t and they won’t. Now, as twenty-somethings they play a game that makes them happy to stay active, have fun, and hang out with friends.

Though, like the Timbits, everyone just wants to touch the puck. They are just searching for their time to shine. Majority of the game turns to anarchy once the team starts to lose. All the reason has gone out the window and suddenly the only thing that matters is “will I be the hero to win the game?” Which contributes to them losing by more.

The most difficult part about watching this team lose, is knowing that they can win. Wherever their lives have taken them, however they approach the game, is different from how it would be approached if they knew it would one day mean something. Instead, they become little Timbits. They become men who swarm the puck in dire desperation to be the hero. It is probably the personal gratification that is both their bane, and contributor to their willingness to keep going.

And, I think personal gratification goes quite well alongside timbits, and beer.