Issue #59 – The Emotions Issue
“I have a character profoundly antagonistic to ordinary domestic life, unfortunately, the disease is also ones material.” -Graham Greene
Sometimes when I sit and watch hockey I become aware of a strange sensation. I’m sitting there, the score is tied 0-0, an ambivalence to the match ever growing. I begin to daydream–thinking about urinating at the next intermission, or folding my laundry, or jerking off to pregnant porn–anything besides what is at stake in the standings, anything besides seeing my heroes scrapping it out before my eyes in beautiful high-definition. I realize I’m not really present. I’m only there because at some predetermined time I decided to do this thing and now I’m doing it. I’m here. I’m here but i’m not here, my passion eroding. I’m alone. I don’t care.
Suddenly Vancouver scores, then they score again. I’m lifted out of my complacency and I enter the game. I’m here, present and engaged. Suddenly the flow of the game begins to materialize. Kesler is skating. Raymond is shooting the puck. Luongo is making key saves at key times. We score again. The game advances, elevates then dissipates, end to end.
Then it is over. A victory. Refreshed and satisfied. I walk out the door, attempt to cross the street to buy a pack of cigarettes and I’m hit and killed instantly by a gravel truck speeding down Main St.
Sport is the great arbiter of emotions for the modern, democratically elected man. When I was a child, sport existed to pass the grueling hours of boredom that seemed to accompany my humble, semi-suburban roots. Later in life, I discovered that artistic and intellectual pursuits could similarly pass the time and also add a little meaning to my existence. When the meanings I discovered in art and letters began to erode, replaced by glimpses of crushing mediocrity, I resorted once again to sport: and hockey: and the Canucks.
Some days I come across in these agnostic entries as a bitter fan. Slumping toward an ending that seems as elusive as death, my journey becomes parallel to that of the Vancouver Canucks simply because they have become seared into my brain from the minute Pavel Bure took off on his first breakaway at Pacific Coliseum.
Their existence has become a parallel to my own pursuits just like a soccer fan in England or a football fan in the US. Man-versus-man; tete et tete; momo e mono. It is a sense of accomplishment and superiority, yes, which forces us to cheer, but there is a deeper relevance then just superiority: solidarity. In a world where everybody is their own sovereign pleasure craft, cruising around at sub-sonic speeds, crashing and avoiding each other and micro-blogging about the miscreant that lives in the apartment next door. In this urban decay we crave solidarity with our neighbor, as much as we loath them.
Why do you think that whenever a natural disaster happens the first emphasis in the news is always on all the courageous and selfless acts that have occurred amongst the calamitous nature of the event?
In a world where everybody hates each other it has always struck me as amusing that we insist on living in such close proximity. In this proximity, we need a martyr: the hockey team will do.
The City of Vancouver has two great arbiters: the weather and the hockey team. They are both controlled–at least on game day–by a supernatural force hell bent on playing Zeus-like with the emotions of the citizens. In the summer, generally it is gorgeous, we don’t need distractions, but come fall, the tides turn, the sky darkens, we are left with litres of rain to decide the outcome of our existence.
Millions of gallons of ink and pixels has been spilled regarding the meaning of the game of hockey to Canadians. More is sure to come. And for the complacent Vancouverite laying on the couch looking for meaning in that first crisp pass out of the defensive zone, win or lose, it’s an experience best shared with ones neighbor.
Because fuck it, we’re all gonna die.
Next Up – New Jersey