I’m … Not… Canadian?

With the start of October comes that one thing that all true Canadians have been longing forward to: the start of hockey season. But for me, it’s different.

You see as someone who’s never really been a fan of hockey I could give less than a damn about who scored what hat trick (and why the hell is one person scoring three goals called a hat trick anyway?) on whom and who beat whom and who’s playing really well “between the pipes.” Does that make me less Canadian than the average Canadian – probably.

I’m not knocking the people who quietly enjoy hockey, nor those who vehemently enjoy hockey, nay, Heaven forefend I would judge them so for their blind devotion to a sports team (I like sports, just not all sports); the people I do mock are those who think that as a non-fan of hockey I’m somewhat less than Canadian.

What makes a Canadian – officially to be a Canadian you kind of have to be born in Canada. I’ve got that part covered. You have to put up with the exact same politicians no matter their party or platforms, been doing that for nigh on thirty three years now. To be Canadian you also have to pay an exorbitant amount of taxes into a system that likes to misuse them and then spend more of those same taxes on useless committees to find out how they were misused. I’ve been doing that. I AM CANADIAN.

Maybe I’m not Canadian because I don’t look down my nose at Americans. I don’t think we’re better than they are. I don’t think our system is necessarily better than theirs; I don’t think beautiful landscape ends at the border between us and them. Maybe some of the problem is that I was raised by both an American and a Canadian. Sure the US has got its share of problems, now more than ever, but tell me what nation is perfect and I’ll show you a future politician trying to sell you something; and it will be you.

Maybe I’m not Canadian because my sport of choice is the NFL football. The CFL vs. NFL are really just a microcosm for this whole Canadian vs. American thing you know: the CFL uses more land than the NFL (10 yards), you get points in the CFL even when you don’t accomplish anything, the CFL has just a few teams (provinces) vying for a “championship” while the NFL has considerably more. Sure the CFL is fast, but that’s because if you stop you’ll get really cold (or the mosquitoes will fly off with a Bluebomber).

I tend to surround myself with people who feel the same; the Joe Vanoski and the Instant Death Overtime exchanges come to mind (you know who you are).

This winter I’m going to sit around and say, once again, to my coworkers that I’m not a big hockey fan; I will pay attention to the morning scores so that I can talk with my coworkers (some vague part of me cares about their interests and doesn’t mind talking to them about it) but while I’m listening to them extol the virtues of Luongo, my mind will be asking itself this: Who are the Bears playing this weekend?