You’ve Got a Friend in Me

When I started hockey I remember playing goalie and forward as my positions. Alternating every other game as a goalie and right wing with my friend and teammate Eli Bulba. By playing these two positions I believe that helped me be able to learn and see the game of hockey from different points of view which helped me learn and understand the game of hockey better. The attributes that helped me to help a friend / teammate and need was patience and being calm. Ever since I can remember whether it be in baseball, soccer, hockey, tennis and golf or golf. At the end of the day it is just a game. Which also helped myself with being calm and my sporting activities. It was my first year of bantams we all were thirteen through fourteen when I met a friend that was in need this friend / teammates name was Eli Michaud. He was just getting back into hockey and figured that for his lack of skating skills he would make up for it by taking up the position of goalie. Although I feel that the goalie usually happens to be one of the stronger skaters on the hockey team. You I miss you lack the confidence that was needed to play his position correctly. I remember that if he thought that he was going to play he got sick to her stomach and there was a couple of games he was supposed to start that he or his parents would call and say he wasn’t going to make it. At this point Coach Dave st. Hilaire wanted me to skate out and play forward as a right-wing as my primary position because we now with addition of Eli miss you we had three goalies including myself but the team only needed to. And practices I can recall always going up to you I miss you and trying to help him with his goalie techniques. Whether it be where to hold his glove, to keeping his chin to his chest so that he would not be taking a puck to the throat. To coming out of the net to meet the skaters at their angles to make the net seem smaller. By doing all this I was hoping to boost his confidence. As teammates / friends we all would skate harder, and play smarter so that he would not have to face many shots on goal. Which in turn develop his confidence so that our second year he was no longer scared, nervous or sick before games. Later on you I miss you confidence built up enough for him to become the starting Varsity goalie of his high school the messalonskee Eagles. Being the friend in need I needed a friend indeed. It was Christmas Eve when my dad came riding down the road to our house on a snowmobile. I was at first confused on who was writing down our road and around the house to only stop in our driveway. When I put on my boots and coat to go out and see who had pulled up to my surprise and my siblings it was our dad climbing off the snowmobile nonchalantly. I was extremely excited to see this for one we never had a snowmobile and to all of my friends had one and kept trying to get anyone to go out riding together as a pack. I could not stop thinking about all of the stories I was told of all my friends out riding together and now I was going to be able to be part of it with them. I can recall the first time ever riding a snowmobile the night that my dad let me try it for the first time. After he showed me how to operate it safely he let me go on the snowmobile trail through the field right next to our house on my own to try it. Finally a week later after I tried it for the first time I got to go on my first group ride with the pack that I heard all the stories about. The first time I went out with the group I was both excited and nervous, finally my first group ride. I was nervous do to the lack of confidence and ability to keep up with the group while out riding together. The excitement on my first ride down the freshly groomed snowmobile trails and the untouched fresh powder in the fields. To my surprise and everyone else’s I was able to keep up with the group riding at the speeds they normally did. But I lacked the skills and confidence to carve through the fields of fresh powder like I watch everyone else do with ease. With the help of my friends explaining and showing me tips and tricks of how to carve by using your bodyweight in the center of gravity on a snowmobile I then could do it with ease after practice. Finally we got a big snow storm that brought us fresh powder for all the fields that we ride in. We were all in communication with each other with our minute-by-minute activities leading up to all of us being able to go out riding together to carve and record our trip. When we all started to get ready and we’re all about to leave to meet up I found out from my dad that he wasn’t going to let me go out riding with the pack. When I found this out I was upset that I wasn’t going to be able to carve in the fields and record the ride with everyone. So when I told the group the news they all asked why not and I had to explain to them that I couldn’t go because my siblings and I went on our deck earlier and packed down the snow without shoveling it and it all began to ice up. Now it all had to be chipped, broken up and shoveled before I could go riding and there was no way I was going to be able to have it done in time to go riding. When I told the group about this they all were upset and said not to worry about it and it was okay but in my head it wasn’t because I wasn’t able to go riding with them so I finished getting dressed and then went outside to begin working on chipping the ice and hoped for a miracle to be able to go out riding. But to my surprise my miracle was answered when I heard a group of snowmobiles pull into my driveway so I went to see who it was and to my surprise it was Adam, Ried, Kohl, Cole, Gabe coming to help me chip and shovel so we could all go out riding as the pack. With the help of all of them we had the deck and stairs done in a matter of no time and I was then allowed to go out riding with the group to the field to carve and record or adventure together. Now Eli and I both were friends in need at one point and bot had a friend or friends in deed help us to gain both of our confidence when we were starting something for the first try and also look out and come all together as one to help that friend in need.

Photo by predphan on Trend hype / CC BY-NC-SA