Some People Count Sheep, Why Do I Relive Scoring Hockey Goals?

We all know that when you can't fall asleep, the common advice is to count sheep.  But has anyone ever told you to relive your most exciting personal sports successes?  Well, that's what I do, and it's led me to ask myself "Some People Count Sheep, Why Do I Relive Scoring Hockey Goals?"

The cement playground in front of my apartment building

For a short, skinny, Jewish kid from Brooklyn, I would say I'm a decent athlete.  I grew up on the 18th floor of a twenty-three story high-rise apartment building.  I didn't grow up honing my baseball skills shagging fly balls in my backyard, sliding easily on fluffy green grass to make a great catch.  No, instead, I snared line drives fired off my closet door by diving across my rugged carpeted floor resulting in some pretty nasty rug burns.  I only ice skated a few times as a kid, yet I learned to handle a hockey puck by practicing shooting tennis balls through a small opening in my sliding closet doors with a broken-bladed hockey stick.  And my basketball skills?  I got those by shooting a bright orange rubber basketball into a cardboard box with the bottom cut out and taped to my wall.  No one would ever mistake me for Cal Ripken, Wayne Gretzky or Michael Jordan, but on the cement playgrounds in Brighton Beach, some did call me mini Air Jordan.  Don't laugh, I'm serious!

I went to college at RPI.  That's short for Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.  RPI had one Division I sports team in hockey.  That was it!  So our lives revolved around going to hockey games.  Right after getting to RPI, I joined the Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity.  One of the best parts of fraternity life was the intramural sports.  Having never really skated before, I decided not to play on the fraternity ice hockey team.  But after going to watch a game, I decided I had to try to put my puck handling skills to the test.  I rushed out the next day to the hockey shop and bought myself all new hockey equipment, and within a few days found myself dressing for my first ice hockey experience.  As soon as I stepped onto the ice, I knew this was the best decision of my life.  And then I fell.  And I fell again.  And again.  And again.  In fact, I spent so much time laying on the ice, they starting calling me The Mattress.

Dressing for the game

So I decided to dedicate myself to practicing my skating at the expense of some silly college courses and quickly put my Mattress days behind me and became one of our better players.  Our team wasn't that good that year, but we managed to make the playoffs, and found ourselves down a goal with seconds to go and the goalie pulled.  The puck found its way to the point, where our biggest defenseman, standing a good 6' 7" on skates, blasted the puck toward the net.  I had positioned myself to the side of the opposing goalie and managed to get a stick on the incoming shot, deflecting it up and over the goalie's pads and into the back of the net.  The crowd of at least ten fans went nuts and we were headed to overtime, and then eventually to a shoot out.  With a 1-0 lead after one round of shots, I got the call to give it a go. With all eyes focused on me, I scooped up the puck at center ice and raced toward the net.  It felt like I was flying, but in reality I think I was probably skating pretty slowly.  As I neared the net, I faked a shot and then slide the puck to the right to my backhand.  The goalie slid over to block the shot and I quickly drew the puck back the my forehand and lifted a shot into the vacated net.  It was the most incredible feeling I had ever felt playing sports.  For a few seconds, I could hear nothing.  I was truly floating on clouds as I skated away from the net, pumping my fist and eventually high fiving my teammates on the bench.  I don't think I slept a wink that night thinking about how I had saved the day!

Now, almost twenty years later, I often find myself run down from a long day of work, taking care of the kids, and numerous other responsibilities.  Yet I lay in bed at night with too much on my mind to drift off to sleep.  So I do what relaxes me most.  I close my eyes and transport myself back to that incredible late night in March 1994 and relive scoring hockey goals.  Why does it relax me so much?  Perhaps it's because I can feel the complete calm that came over me in those seconds after I scored in the shootout.  Perhaps it's because for just one night in my life, I accomplished what so many little kids fantasize about...scoring the winning goal in the final seconds and becoming a hero.  Or perhaps it's because I know that while my best athletic days are clearly behind me now (I can't even run to the mailbox without catching my breath), I can always close my eyes and for a moment feel young again.

What's your shining moment?  What accomplishment do you often think about from your younger days to make you feel better?  Please take a moment to share a comment below with all of my readers!