As I sit
here, bawling my eyes out while trying to absorb this 7-0 loss in Game 5, the
decisive game of this AHL first round series, I can’t help but try to write
down my one last goodbye to the team I’ve come to know and love over these past
few years – the Houston Aeros. While the Aeros have been in Houston for nearly
40 years, I have only known them over the past three. Now don’t go and call me
a “bandwagon fan” or a kid that doesn’t know hockey and can’t understand how
much this team means, because I wouldn’t be sitting here drowning in my own
tears (I’m not big on crying) if I wasn’t. I have travelled thousands of miles,
making road trips to Austin and San Antonio, even flying to Chicago at one
point, just to catch an Aeros game. I have come to meet and become great
friends with many fellow fans. And overall, I have gotten to know this team
personally, including radio announcer Joe O’Donnell, whose final words cutting the
string and tying the bow on the end of this era of hockey in Houston has been
the hardest thing I, and perhaps many other fellow Aeros fans, have heard all
season, the final one of this franchise.
I’m
reminded of my first Aeros game, the first hockey game I ever attended, going
in and thinking “What the hell? I don’t know anything about hockey. I didn’t
even know hockey existed in Texas. Only hockey I’ve ever seen was during the
Olympics!” Little did I know, that this would become the one thing that made me
happy while I was struggling with all the emotions every angst-filled teen
suffered through, the first sports game I actually paid attention to from start
to finish because I wasn’t sweating my ass off in the outside Texas heat at a
football stadium, and the thing that finally brought my family together and
became a regular family-night occurrence as the only thing we could all agree
on and enjoy. And as I sat there, not quite glass-seats but close enough to
feel the cold of the ice creeping through the cracks in the panels, I got my
first taste at ice hockey, the greatest sport to ever hit the planet…and the
boards. My parents had attended one game before, deciding to drag me along for
the second, hopeful I might actually enjoy a sport for once. Though unlike
their first game where no fights occurred, foolishly leading them to think
maybe this was a more “family-oriented” team (yeah right), five fights broke
out within the first period grabbing my violence-loving attention from the get-go.
Infamous Matt Kassian, now playing for the Ottawa Senators, was a fan favorite
of the Aeros, and my first big influence (literally) into the hockey-loving
world. And besides this period, I can’t really remember much other than that
the Aeros lost this game, and that despite that loss, I had more fun in just a
few hours than I had in the past few months, finding reason to attend another
game…after all, I hadn’t seen them win yet.
Unfortunately,
it wouldn’t be until next season when I saw the Aeros again, but at least they
won that second game I attended, giving me a hunger for another hockey game,
and another, and another. Before you knew it, we had season tickets to the
Calder Cup playoffs, and the season thereafter after losing in the finals to
Binghamton. The hockey addiction had settled in, and the memories were made
game after game. Acquaintances became friends, and friends became second
family. Even the team itself I had come to know personally over the past few
seasons, not something you get with many other sports teams. Through the ups
and the downs, I stayed by the team I’d come to know and love more than Leafs
fans have held onto the hopes of making the playoffs over the past ten years.
This
attachment – no, this ADDICTION, to hockey and the Aeros has made this final
season the most heartbreaking. As the Aeros are unable to renew their lease
agreement that dramatically rose from $24K to $42K because of Les Alexander’s
greediness, hockey is saying goodbye to Toyota Center, and goodbye to Houston,
crushing every fan’s heart that has stood by them until the very end. Though I
may not be one of those old Canadian immigrants, shaking their canes at Toyota
Center shouting “You killed hockey! Gordie Howe played here and you youngins
will never appreciate this history like I do! I was attending hockey games while
you was still in diapers!” I will be that girl, standing on the stones outside
Toyota Center that read “Loyal Rockets fan” with a chisel stabbing away and
engraving “FUCK YOU LES” so large Google Maps will see it. And as much as I
would never WISH anything bad to happen to the Rockets or greedy bastard, money-hungry,
soul-crushing, overall no-shit-giving, it’s “just business” asshole that is Les
Alexander…I wouldn’t cry if his brand new scoreboard fell on him and he finally
realized he can’t take that money to the grave.
Yes, I’m
upset. Yes, I’m spiteful. Yes, I have cried enough to fill a bucket full
of tears to shove Alexander’s face in and watch him drown in my sorrow. No, I
have not given up hope that hockey will return to Houston. As we sit together
in watch parties, cheering for the Rockets to lose every game from here until
eternity, I believe we all hold out hope that one day the Aeros will return to
Houston. We’ve had them once, we’ve had them twice, and perhaps a third time is
all we need to realize that hockey belongs in Houston, and the Aeros are meant
to stay. We’ll be waiting for the return of the Aeros. Waiting to return to our
seats – whether they be glass seats, center ice, or end zone – and say hello to
our old friends again while we drink away at overpriced beer. Waiting to stand
on our feet as we ring our cowbells and watch a rival goalie die a little
inside after every goal while we chant our chants. Waiting to hear “Return your
tables to an upright lock position, we’re coming in for a landing” one more
time. We’ll be waiting with open arms and sticks in hand, ready for a hockey
hug when the Aeros come back to Houston.
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