A Christmas story

Once upon a time, there was a 12-year old boy who lived in Detroit and was a big hockey fan. It was the days of the six-team National Hockey League. Although it was a competitive league, the Montreal Canadiens were the gold standard. They won five Stanley Cups in a row from 1956-60 and seriously contended just about every year they didn't win.

The hometown Red Wings? They made the playoffs just about every season but couldn't get over the hump, even losing in the Stanley Cup Finals two years in a row.

The boy knew all this and a lot more. That’s because he listened to just about every game -- the only way for a youngster to follow the team. At the time, there was no local television of Detroit games. On Saturday nights, when he could convince his mother to switch away from Lawrence Welk (which aired at the same time), he would get to watch “Hockey Night In Canada.” But Detroit games were blacked out. (Playoff games were televised on tape delay at 11:30 p.m. Try explaining that one to your mother.) Olympia Stadium, their home rink, was usually sold out. Even if he could find a ticket, the rink was located in a "bad" area of town, a place his mother wouldn't dream of letting her young son visit.

The only time the lad ever saw his favorite team play came when Detroit played a nationally televised Sunday afternoon game from Chicago, New York or Boston.

Christmas, 1965 came with the usual trimmings. As was house tradition, the lad and his brothers were allowed to open one gift when the family came home from Midnight Mass. He scouted the horizon in advance for possibilities. There was the usual thin box from Aunt Marcie – handkerchiefs. There were big boxes (toys, he hoped). There were square boxes that he knew from experience were clothes.

Then he spotted something unusual. In the corner of the pile of gifts was an envelope with his name on it. Since it wasn't stamped or addressed, his mind began to race. What kind of gift could be in an envelope?

For some reason, he reached for it as a first choice. His mother stopped him, saying "Save that for Christmas Day.” When you tell a kid that at the holidays, you drive the interest level up astronomically. Fearing he might miss out on another gift, the boy reluctantly obeyed.

A restless night was spent wondering what could kind of gift could be in an envelope? Why couldn’t he open that one first?

Morning finally came. When the feast of gifts was nearly complete, the boy was left with the envelope. Go ahead, said his mother. Now you can open it. The boy opened it and stared in disbelief. It was two tickets to see the Red Wings play, of all teams, Montreal at the Olympia the next night. His older brother Johnny was going to take him to see the players he knew so well but had rarely seen.

His joy was such that the boy never noticed the location of the seats. The tickets were stamped "Standing Room” – a concept he knew nothing about. "Oh, it will be fine," his brother assured him.

For once, Christmas dragged as he eagerly waited the next night. The Olympia was a wonderful mystery. The boy knew the building was red on the outside but that was it. Walking in the door, he was struck immediately by the large scoreboard hanging over the center ice. It was an old clock with smaller clocks for the penalties. In the final minute of play, it changed colors (green to red is the way the lad remembers it.)

"Where are we sitting?" the boy asked his brother.

"We're not," he said. "We have standing room."

"Where's that?"

"Wherever we can find a place. Quit asking questions.”

The two walked around the building for a long time, looking for a place to stand. As game time neared, they still hadn't found a place where they could see the ice very well. The pair wandered into the balcony. At that point, an angel appeared in the form of an usher.

"Where's your seats, boys?" he asked gruffly.

We showed him our tickets. "Can't stand up here," he said. "Standing room is downstairs."

The boy began to cry. "This is my first game ever and I can't see anything," he said.

The usher stopped waving people to their seats. "First game, eh?" he said. "There is one place you can stand but you can't tell anybody I told you about this."

He took the two boys to a corner of the upper deck. There was a small platform with a spotlight – the kind you used to see when the circus came to town. "Stand here," he said. "Nobody will bother you. It's kinda high but you'll see everything from there. I like watching the game from here myself."

The usher was right. The players looked like ants in the far corner of the ice but you could see everything.

The Red Wings and Canadiens didn't disappoint. It was a terrific hockey game. Detroit attacked Montreal goalie Gump Worsley constantly but couldn't get a goal. Montreal did the same to Detroit's Roger Crozier but couldn't score themselves.

The game was still scoreless in the third period. The clock changed colors for the final time.

This wasn't possible. How you could you go to a NHL game and not see a goal?

Then it happened. A shot came from the point that Worsley could only knock down. Alex Delvecchio swooped in and batted the loose puck into the net.

The boy jumped so high he nearly fell out of the alcove. He had no idea how much time was left but it was clear it was the final minute of the game. The Wings ran out the clock and took the 1-0 win.

The boy has probably seen 1500 hockey games in his lifetime. But he remembers that one as if it happened last night.

Since then, the boy has received many envelopes as gifts. They have contained cash or gift certificates – very good things, indeed. But he still cherishes the memory of that first envelope. It wasn’t until four decades later he learned the official value of it was four dollars – two dollars per ticket.

To the boy’s way of thinking, however, it was, indeed, priceless.

Starting over (happily)

It was the phone call I had been waiting to hear for the past 26 months.

"You start Monday at 8:30 a.m," the voice said. "Minnesota Department of Education in Roseville. You need directions?"

I told the voice I would happily look up how to get there. Turns out to be about 10 minutes from the house.

Since October 2008, I have been semi-employed. I made phone calls. I sent emails. I sent letters. I sent resumes. I sent updated resumes. Sometimes you got a form email saying they had received your stuff and was reviewing it. Many times, I simply never heard from the company. I would call and sometimes get a real person to tell me they had my information. Much of the time, however, the best I could do was leave a message that would never get returned.

I had come close a few times to getting back to fulltime work -- been a finalist at least twice that I knew of. But something always seem to happen.

I would get a phone call, a letter or an email saying somebody else had the job. Sometimes I got a reason. Most of the time I did not. Didn't matter, though. The result was the same as when nobody called at all.

I understood this wasn't personal. I understood why someone with less experience would get hired for a job. I would listen to the great thinkers and talkers of our time opine that anybody who really wants a job can get one. The people saying this were usually folks with nice, comfy gigs already. They hadn't sent out the letters I (and many others) had sent. They may even believed what they were saying.

I worked at staying positive. (Most days, I was.) I worked at being creative. I worked at part-time gigs. I prayed. I asked friends and family to keep an eye out for me and let me know of any openings they heard of. To the many people who did just that, I say "Thank You" for your kindness and patience with me.

I was told early last week the MDE was getting ready to hire for an open position and that I had a real good shot at it. For two days after, I stared at the phone every time it rang. On Thursday, the call finally came. I felt like someone who just snagged a prom date with their dream queen (or king).

Now comes the hard part. When you have been off for 2+ years, you eventually lose an edge. Your skills get a little rusty. Oh, I have done plenty of writing. I think I know what they need and feel confident I can provide it for them. But it will require getting back on the horse. It will require getting used to the routine of getting up early, cleaning up and getting into the office by 8:30 a.m. five days a week. It will require discipline, getting to know new people and a new job.

That is all easier said than done. Bad habits are easy to make. They are also hard to break.

There is one last thing: I am thrilled (and grateful) beyond words to be back working again. Some people I don't really know that well are putting a lot of trust in me. I am flattered by that and anxious to prove them right. The new job starts in 9 1/4 hours. So now I need to get some restful sleep.

I hope I remember how to do that.