The Old Woman and the Boston Bruins

Growing up, I lived across the street from an elderly woman, Minnie. She was the stereotypical "old lady" who just didn't like kids in a neighborhood just crawling with kids. Frankly, we were all a little afraid of this large, scary woman who really didn't like us. My family moved to the neighborhood when I was 4, and for the next 6-years I pretty much lived in fear of this woman.

1980 saw the US Olympic Men's Hockey team defeated the heavily favored Soviet team to advance to play for the gold medal - "Do you believe in miracles?" At age 10, I had no idea what had happened, but I knew it was something big. Jim Craig, the US Goalkeeper, was from Massachusetts and was a bit of a crush for Minnie. To this day, I have no idea how I came to be in her favor, but it was like a thaw had occurred. She began to share with me her significant collection of Sporting News back-issues, and fostered in me a love of the Boston Bruins. What a pair we must've been - the elderly shut-in and the junior high student standing together on her front porch, with nothing apparently in common, talking about the Bruins.

I don't think I ever learned the origin of this love of hockey - whether it was simple infatuation with the hometown hero or if it went back to a childhood in the Canadian Maritime Provinces - but it was real and it was genuine. She taught me to love Rick Middleton and Terry O'Reilly...and the Bruins.

She did not live to see the 1987-1988 Stanley Cup Finals, and perhaps it is just as well given the way her beloved Bruins fell to the Oilers, in 4 ½ games. With the arena air-conditioning battling to control the rising temperature, the electric system in the Boston Garden became overtaxed and ultimately failed. The 3-3 game was canceled in the second period. In the next game, the Oilers won their 4^th Stanley Cup on home ice.

I think about her today on the brink of Game 7 of the 2010-2011 Stanley Cup finals. I can picture her large frame in a drab housecoat and slippers cheering on Tim Thomas, Shawn Thornton, David Krejci, Zdano Chara, Milan Lucic, and Mark Recchi, although I can also imagine her sometimes ribald commentary about how to actually pronounce some of the names and asking "exactly what is a 'Canuck' anyway?" There might even be a play on the phonemes that the slang for "Canadian" and the slang for carnal activity share in common, although I cannot say for certain. I got to share a bond with this woman in a way that I think she had not allowed herself to share with anyone in a very long time.

So tonight, as the puck drops on Game 7, I'll be thinking of an elderly woman, long since deceased who is doubtlessly cheering on the Black and Gold "B." Godspeed Minnie, and God Bless.

VIDEO:
Game 4 1987-1988 Stanley Cup Finals: http://youtu.be/7yTVfJNQQiw