Silentpoet's Music Emporium

[Huaco Kid]

The rink had a private contractor that ran the food court.

[Huaco Kid]

Sometimes they'be open,  and all the Dad's had hot coffee at -20°,  at 4am.

[Huaco Kid]

Sometimes they'd be closed,  and all the drunken Dad's would curse your Momma,  for the next two hours.

[Huaco Kid]

Once,  at 4am,  in a game!,  the Ref's called Whistle!

Blood all over the ice!

We were, only, like, 6.  So we had no goons, yet.

It took a long time,  they (high school refs)  almost called the game.

[Huaco Kid]

My parents were so cheap,  that I got Sears catalog skates.  Wishbook!!

But it was 76!!!!

So they were red-white-and-blue.  $15 skates.

 

[Huaco Kid]

And the toes were red. (Kind Of Like Evel Knievel!!)

And everywhere I got nailed,  and slid around,  I left red skid-marks all over.

So then,  bleeding was allowed,  and the game could continue.

[Huaco Kid]

One game,  where we had to clean the ice ourselves, and time was almost up....

 

both teams did it.

We all shot the puck over the wall,  into the frozen lake below.

And then a kid, or two, would go down to the lake to "find it",  and more pucks went over,  and more kids went down...

that all the pucks and all the kids were down on the lake,  playing no-rules hockey (we didn't even have nets!),  there were, like three games at once,  all mixed up together.  I don't even know where the goalies came from.

So they just let us go.

And all the Dad's probably split a bottle,  that someone had.

[Huaco Kid]

My best friend lived next to the park.

His Dad worked there his whole life.

A Union laborer.  No OT, no pension.

[Huaco Kid]

They all would show up at the bar at 4am. Every. Single. Day.

The bar would open, just for them.  Shots and beers and take a couple bottles to work with them.

At lunch,  they'd get shots and beers,  and take a couple bottles with them.

At 4pm,  they'd all go get drunk.

[Huaco Kid]

He did it for 30 years,

[Huaco Kid]

Ed was my best friend.

And the only reason I lived.

His Dad was a drunk.

My Dad was a drunk.

(but a rich professional one)

[Huaco Kid]

Ed pulped many people,  that came at me.  (esp: hockey)

and I paid him back in skinney-unnoticed ways,  which you can't do,  but I could do.

Ed would get arrested.  And I'd go to jail,  and they'd let me go, and whatever Ed did, didn't matter (except for the Moon mthrfckrs), and no one would get yelled at.  Mom didn't even know,  because Ed did it.

[Huaco Kid]

Ed had 15 cars.  For work and school.

At -20°,  we had our pick!

But only one battery.

You had to go from car-to-car to see which one would start.

That particular car would never get you to where you were going,  but we got, mostly, away.

Now you have to find a pay-phone,  so Ed could call one of his girlfriend's,  to bring you gas money.

We did this every day..

[Huaco Kid]

And, three times each week,  We'd go to high school hockey games (fck Moon),  and need more girlfriends and more gas money,  because we hated driving with Mom,

[Huaco Kid]

And Ed would fight everyone after the game,  in the parking lot, (fck Richland),  and then they'd leave,  and we had no gas,  and the girlfriends left, 

We'd go to payphones and vending machines to find 45¢.

If we didn't have enough gas to go to school tomorrow,  we just didn't go.

[Huaco Kid]

So, high school!,  we won regionals and were going to States!

R&R Tie Domi we were !!!

So,  Ed,  and the older kids,  had 47 bottles of wine in their hockey bags,  on the luxury bus ride to Erie.  This is how we roll.

Halfway,  the bus stopped at McDonalds,  and we all ordered no food,  but 37 cups of ice. And they gave them to us.

Mr. May knew,  be he had enough teenage hijinks to fill his full-time.

The varsity team won.

Our JV lost,  pretty good,  probably because Ed got us bottles of wine, each.

[Huaco Kid]

So we lost first.

Varsity was playing.

We decided we needed cups of ice, or something.

There was a 7-11,  a mile down the Erie-snow mountain.  We could see it just sitting there.

So 30 kids bolted down the mountain,  hootin and hollerin,  all all wine, and more.....

and we hit the bottom of the hill,  right next to the road,  across from the 7-11.

[Huaco Kid]

And this road had a 15' ditch next to it.

30 kids,  into a snow-drift ditch.

I hit ground.  I could see the sky.  I screamed as loud as I could.  You can hear zero report.  Absolutely nothing.  Not even yourself.

Ed'll probably save me.

It took a long time to claw myself back up to asphalt,  and 30 kids breaking the surface,  at the same time.

So we smoked more,  and got slim-jims and slurpees,  and had a great time.

[Huaco Kid]

Hockey wasn't about winning.

We didn't care.

It was about Ed fighting in the parking lot, after...

 

 

[Huaco Kid]

"Ed! Who cares! No!  Not now!. Nothing happened!"

Fck.

There goes Ed.

[Huaco Kid]

If it's Ed-on-one, let them go.  It'll only take a minute.

If the other team jumps in,  then we do too.  It's a massacre brawl now.

It still only takes a minute.

Sticks are always involved.  Stick-on-stick.  Takes a minute.

Sometimes we'd all drink beer together,  after the Ed-thing.

[Huaco Kid]

My one other friend,  that played hockey for the Catholic team ("I'mma hit you soooooooo hard,  that your Momma gonna forget your name!")

Would arrange meet-up fights with other teams (Moon and Richland, probably).

Would have cases of Strohs,  which we couldn't have,  get drunk,  bring his "fighting shirt" (N Catholic Hockey sweater with blood stains on it)

and he, also, weighed 100 lbs,  but could fight like a honey-badger-on-meth!

A crazy Mike Tyson!  A flurry of fists!   It only took a minute.

[Huaco Kid]

We had a great adult team (30+).  Kicking ass. 

(I worked for a Canadian company.  They had, like, five teams)

We signed up for the State Games,  because we were badass.  Got a couple ringers from the college.

[Huaco Kid]

We lost the first game, 10 to 1.

I got the only goal,  and never touched the puck.

It was in,  they had it,  everyone was skating out,  one man in (me), rush!

The guy spun and put it into his own net.

I was closest.  My goal.

[Huaco Kid]

We lost the second game pretty soundly.