Goalie Camp…

So, my son tells me that he is going to be the greatest goalie the NHL has ever seen. Of course I believe him, and not only because I’m his mother. We have traveled 500km so that he can attend the Okanagan Hockey School in Penticton, which has a special goalie program that he has been asking to attend for 3 years now. This is a boarding camp - some students have come from as far away as Phoenix and two boys have come from Tokyo to be here this week!

He is ten years old and has never actually played ice hockey on a team, but has proven himself in impromptu road hockey with his brother and the neighbourhood children and wants desperately to play in a real league … “Look Mum, I can almost do the splits!”

I was worried in bringing him to this camp that the other boys’ skills would be far more advanced than his and he was also nervous, but so far this has not been the case. The camp runs from 8:50am to 8:40pm each day and is filled with lectures, clinics, ice time, motivational discussions, off-ice skill training and team-building exercises. All of the counselors are college or AA players and goalies, and from what I can tell, they are diligently dedicated to developing the next generation of players disguised as ten year olds with wide eyes and what can only be described as gumption.

He is exhausted when I pick him up at 8:45pm each evening, and has an hour to play in the hotel pool or the lake before he falls into bed, out like a light in about 40 seconds flat.

Most of the children here stay in the dormitory and eat via wristbands in the cafeteria for an extra daily charge. My son is the only one who brings his lunch and dinner each day and although I suspect he’d like burgers and fries for lunch from the cafeteria, he says nothing and cheerfully eats the wraps, sandwiches and fruit I send for him and thanks me every evening.

He also didn’t mention to me that his counselors were concerned with the old goalie catcher’s glove he arrived with – that it was too old (we bought it used) for him to properly open and close with a puck flying toward him at 85km/h. It was only when I popped over for a visit to the skill centre and saw for myself, that I realized his training would be hampered by failing to use workable equipment. Yikes! $153.34 for a new goalie glove was worth every penny of the pride I saw on his face when I delivered it just before ice time. The other students and the counselors (bless their hearts) even gathered around to admire it. (I even got a hug – in public, if you can believe that!)

That, the car fiasco (below) and the $62.13 for a new goalie stick because he left his at the rink last night is making this a mammoth financial undertaking… but I know it’s worth it, and I can’t wait to watch him on the ice over the years, proudly cheer him on, while thinking to myself, “That’s my son – I made him in my tummy!”