The Finer Things In Life

My wife and I went to a hockey game last night. We were invited by some friends and had the pleasure of watching the game from one of the luxury suites. It was pretty cool with food, a tv, comfortable seats and people to wait on you. I didn't know the few other people who shared the suite but they were not snobbish and it was a very enjoyable environment, very civilized.

The same cannot be said for the game which the home team won by a score of 9-2. To those familiar with hockey you know that this is a proper beating by hockey standards and one can usually expect fights when the score gets out of hand like this. Actually these teams didn't need a reason to fight as the first one took place just 4 seconds into the game. There was apparently a lot of history involved that I was not up on and there were several fights during the course of the game.

I admit to enjoying hockey along with its fights. I suppose that this is due to a sick part of my nature that relates to a coliseum mindset. But I also like hockey because the referee is limited in his ability to impact the game and there is a lot of justice being served by the players themselves. The fights rarely hurt anyone and there is a certain code of conduct for fights that is usually observed. For the most part the players themselves hold each other accountable for what is within acceptable limits in a game. A player may be sneaky enough to avoid punsihment by the referee but he will rarely avoid punishment from the other team.

I suppose there are many who are offended by my being entertained by such violence and I have probably lost your respect. But I've noticed the same principle sometimes works with my kids. Sometimes the more my wife and I get involved the more frustrated everyone becomes. Somehow when they are left to work it out by themselves they seem to come to an acceptable resolution. Funny how that works. Maybe Kim and I need to spend more time watching them from the luxury suite and let them settle their differences on their own.