WORD BARF #1

Being a lad from Ireland meant that hockey was on par with the Minotaur; you have heard of it and it sounded pretty cool but it was hard to imagine it was real. One day however professional hockey came to Kilkenny and that all changed. I was hooked on the fast paced and violent ice based sport. I watched the games whenever I could get away from school work but that was not enough; I needed to try it for myself. I asked my parents for skates but money was tight and we were on the poor side. I started raking up leaves and walking dogs; I saved every penny until I got my first pair of skates.

The Storm had a free skate every Saturday morning where players would teach us children how to skate and play hockey. We would spend one hour doing practice and one hour doing a fun scrimmage. I lived for those mornings and they soon became the only thing I loved. Looking back now it was funny how terrible we all were but I learned so much from the players and I never really got the chance to thank them. They weren't well paid but these guys gave up their weekends to teach a bunch of Irish kids how to do something they wouldn't use for the rest of their lives.