The Toronto Maple Leafs are in the second round of the playoffs, and for the non-Canadians reading, this is HUGE.
I’ll try to explain: You know how every year, around December 22nd, the air takes on a sparkly charge and random strangers start wishing each other Merry Christmas in passing? Sort of like that, except it’s the first December to arrive here in 19 years, and Santa himself (aka Stanley) has been AWOL since 1967.
People well beyond Toronto’s limits are wishing each other “Go Leafs Go!” in parking lots, checkout lines, in lieu of goodbye as they get off the phone–even though the Leafs have an unspeakably long history of…you know…not going (But seriously, don’t speak of it.)
I’ve long been mystified by the Leafs’ fan base (unwaveringly loyal, perpetually hopeful, doggedly optimistic), and also kinda pissed at the Leafs as a franchise, for repeatedly disappointing people I love.
I don’t watch hockey, but it’s been running in the background my whole life. Don and Ron were the white noise of my childhood. My dad, uncles, cousins, the full rotation of best friends all through school, work colleagues, neighbours, and husband are always watching the game.
Every game.
Always repeating the same mantra (“It’s a rebuilding year”).
Every year.
And though I’ve only basic knowledge of the sport and the franchise, I, too, REALLY want the Leafs to win for them, the fans. For the city where I was born that holds its breath and bites its nails, erupting into a giant blue-and-white beast of elation with every glimmer of hope. For the overserved pedestrian I watched plow into the side of an idling car on Bremner Blvd in a fit of jubilation in ’04 when the Leafs beat the Senators to advance to the second round, and the throng of the people and vehicles around him who froze in concern until he sprung up, determinedly unharmed (and definitely sore tomorrow), shouting “GO LEAFS GOOOOOO!” as the party resumed.
Alas, this story always plays out the same. Flags get folded up for another year, and Leafs Nation shuffles quietly home.
WHY, I ask my hockey loving people, do you put yourselves through this year after year? WHYYY do you willingly hand over your time and money and hopes and dreams and heart like this?
But seriously, the other day I did actually ask them. And their answers had nothing to do with hockey in every way that resonated:
“Because after we immigrated here, my brother and I practiced skating in the pitch dark for hours after the other kids went home. Hockey was our way in, every boy in the class dreamed of being a Leaf and the team was common ground. Cheering for them you always knew you were safe.”
“Because when my grandparents were alive, I could drop by their house on any Saturday night and there they’d be, in their matching recliners, watching the Leaf game.”
“Because the Leafs are the only thing my father and I have ever agreed on.”
“Because crowding around the television for puck drop was our family tradition, and now, some of those family members are gone.”
“Because no matter how low things got, Hockey Night in Canada was the one sure thing. Even if they cut off your cable, you could always get the game.”
“Because as we got older and life got busy, the Leafs were the reason my friends and I still made time for each other.”
“Because when I watched them win the Cup in ’67, they were the underdogs. Everyone kept saying they were too old, they were washed up. And they went and brought it home anyway.”
GO LEAFS GO, indeed.
Cheering for the Leafs, I’ve come to realize, is not really about whether they win (though of course, that’d be nice). It’s not even really about the team itself when you think about it; no player or coach is the same now as when this generation (or the three before it) started cheering for them, much like we’re all made of cells that continuously turn over, such that we eventually consist of entirely new stuff yet we’re still us.
It’s about the magic that lies in the BeLeafing, and how it finds a way to touch everyone uniquely. It’s history, tradition, memory, legacy. It’s the never ending story of relentless perseverance, and blind faith that against every odd, tomorrow just might prove different.
Even the unabating losses unite us in a manner that outsiders can’t fully understand, whether we’re watching on the edge of our seat or trying to tune out the commentators so we can finish our homework.
Tonight, as we head into another too-familiar do-or-die with hopes high and expectations low, I remind myself what Leafs fans everywhere seem to have long accepted as true: the final score doesn’t matter all that much, anyway. It’s always been more about what’s transpiring in the stands than on the ice.
The following quote pertains to football, not hockey, but Coach Ted Lasso said it best when questioned about letting the fans into the stadium to watch his team practice:
“It’s their team. We’re just borrowing it for a little while.”
Rachel Stone 