I was pretty frustrated when I checked out of my Buffalo hotel in the early afternoon on game day. I had set my own personal ultimatum for this trip, and things weren’t looking good. Essentially, this trip was supposed to (ideally) give me some insight as to whether or not this wild goose chase for the prophesized, Arizona connected, love of my life was really worth it. When predictions, dreams, and gut feelings are all you have to go on, it doesn’t take much to start making you think that you’ve lost your mind. My head felt really foggy that day, like my third eye had finally clouded over. I had plans for future road trips, and suddenly I couldn’t see myself at the games – I couldn’t see myself anywhere.
My usual pregame Sabres routine is to go for a drive around Buffalo and the surrounding area. I looked down at the clock – it was 2:22 PM. “Hmph!” I thought to myself. You know how much I love signs, and 222 is the number that symbolizes that everything is happening the way that it is supposed to happen. How could this be? Everything seemed to be going wrong or mysteriously backfiring! Was this fate in action? And what was this supposed to mean? I had selected the Ralph Wilson Stadium as a point of destination, but the memory of wrong turns taken years before entered my mind, and I decided it was best to turn around and go some place else. I looked to my right and I saw a church in the distance. I decided I would get off at the next exit and turn around at the old building. As I approached the church, I noticed a sign out front that got my attention, “The Shrine of Saint Jude.”
I was stunned that I had stumbled upon such a place, you see, Saint Jude is the patron saint of hope, and hopeless cases, and he is often credited as being the saint that brings about miracles. Last season, when I suspected that I was switching teams to Phoenix, I sought out Saint Jude, and began wearing a medallion of his likeness to every game. However, I had lost my medallion in a very bizarre way. One week before the trade deadline, I was waiting for my flight out of Philadelphia after my last two games at Wachovia Center. My flight was at night, so I decided to kill some time and check out the Flyers Wives Carnival. My jaunt around the concourse was stopped abruptly when I felt my Saint Jude medal fall from my neck never to be found again. I looked up from the scene of the loss and who was standing there unbeknownst to me? Yes, the very player who ended up being traded and catapulting me into my Arizona quest for true love.
I never replaced my medallion, but the thought had crossed my mind before I left for Pittsburgh that maybe I should have. I decided that I would park the car and go check out the shrine. The church was on a lonely street with quaint little houses uniformly decorated for Halloween. A cold wind blew through my hair as I walked toward the church yard, which set the tone for the gravity of autumn, and the impending death and darkness of winter. I walked through the gate, and rang the doorbell of the rectory. The priest answered the door wearing a brown robe, and agreed to give me a tour of the church and show me the shrine.
The priest was a really nice guy. He asked me what made me become such a devoted Jets fan (he kept referring to Phoenix as Winnipeg even though I had told him Phoenix). Naturally, I wasn’t going to talk to a priest about psychics and predictions – I really didn’t need to have that lecture before game time. I can’t remember what I said, but he turned to me, smiled, and said, “Uh huh, so which player is the cutest?” Surprisingly, I actually told him.
For a good half an hour, the priest explained the architecture of the building, and the historical inaccuracies of the stained glass windows. He then left me to have my alone time with the shrine. I placed my wish for assistance in finding my Arizona boy along with the other prayers gathered at the foot of Saint Jude. I lit two of the red candles (one for me and one for the boy) positioned in a crucifix formation in front of the shrine. The priest gave me two novena kits and booklets about the saint while I was on my way out. He grabbed my hand, and placed two Saint Jude medallions in my palm and blessed them. The blessing was for the medals to bring hope not only to me but also to those who see the medal around my neck. After the strange few days that I had, hope was exactly what I needed.
Back in the car, I was suddenly overwhelmed. It took all my strength to fight off having a massive, tearful, emotional breakdown. The last thing I needed was to have mascara smears on my face by game time. To lighten up, I went on a hunt to find the Halloween superstore that was advertised on billboards all over the highway, and also decided that now would be a good time to finally give into the McDonald’s craving I had been having all week.
The game was kind of slow. Luckily, I had two “outgoing” Sabres fans on either side of me to keep me entertained. By “outgoing” I mean they liked to bang on the glass and yell loudly at the Coyotes bench. Unfortunately, my attempt to be the hero cost me the greatest embarrassment of my entire hockey game going career. After the guys were ripping on Shane Doan, I said, “You can’t say that to Shane Doan; it’s Shane Doan!” Seriously, how could anyone hate him? He’s always so happy! I can’t remember what they said, but I replied with, “Everyone loves Shane Doan!” Apparently, they interpreted this as me wanting Doan’s ass. Eeek – impure thoughts of Shane Doan just seems wrong and inappropriate. You can understand how mortified I was when the guys started banging on the glass and yelling to Shane that I wanted to have “little Doans” and that I want “Doan’s shaft.” They said I turned the same colour as my top – Coyotes red.
I arrived home in Toronto at 2:22 AM, and waiting for me was the terrible, ugly, Chlamydic mule of reason that my progress had halted. It was a good thing that I was sitting on my bed when I saw it because my head started spinning, and I don’t doubt that I would have fainted had I been standing. I can’t help but feeling that this was what it feels like to lose game seven of the Stanley Cup Finals. To know that you had given so much, sacrificed so much, gone so far, only to come up short. The weird thing was that I had dreamt this exact moment the night before I left for Pittsburgh, but I still wasn’t prepared for it when it was staring me in the face. That night I decided to break up with the Coyotes. Not necessarily to end our team to fan relationship, but to at least give it some time and space, and reevaluate the situation. I said what I needed to say, but it was one of the hardest things I ever had to do. I can only imagine that breaking up with a person feels just as bad.
The following day was hard to get through. I really felt like it was an effort to be pleasant to other people, and I actually felt my whole body strain with every effort to smile. Strangely, the fog clouding my third eye during my inaugural hockey road trip had lifted, and I was able to see myself at the Coyotes games again. I also had Coyotes signs flying at me from every angle. I didn’t know what was going on, and I’m still evaluating my next course of action, but all I can hope is that, like the number suggests, destiny is manifesting the way it’s supposed to.
Tags: buffalo, buffalo sabres, Phoenix Coyotes, psychics, road trips, saint jude
Don’t lose hope. I had gone through a similar experience twelve years ago and I ignored the signs. Here we are today and I feel regret. I also feel like my gut is telling me to proceed in a new direction which is oddly similar