Self Story #4- Gender

 

I was living a “typical” teenage boy life in my Grade 11 school year. My Midget house league hockey team combined with a close town, Whitewood, was playing game 3, round 2 of playoffs in our small-town arena. It was no doubt a huge game for everybody on my hockey team, but also a big game for the parents, community and fans. The series was best of five, my team was down two games, so this was a crucial do or die game for us.

 

As I finished getting dressed in our teams dressing room, my heart started beating fast just as it did before every hockey game. The coach came into our room and gave a pep talk and game plan like always then out we went onto the ice. As the game was about to start, my line started to get pumped up and ready to go. I played centre this hockey season, definitely my favourite position. As we got ready to line up at center ice, I distinctly remember looking to my left seeing all of my girl friends cheering hard waving their posters up and down being our number one fans. Within the crowd, I could spot a big, bright and colorful poster that read “#6 on the ice, #1 in our hearts”. It was a poster made by a couple of my close female classmates, always around to support me. After a few seconds of skimming the crowd, the whistle blew, and the referee dropped the puck. Game time!! Looking back, this is definitely a moment of mine where I feel as though I “performed my gender perfectly”. All my male buddies were on my team, and just above and next to our team bench were the screaming girls. The game was intense and with the support of our fans we ended up pulling out a win, forcing our opposing team to game number four. Normally after our hockey games, whether we won or lost, the girls would always wait for us hockey players outside our dressing room to give us a big hug and talk about the game.

 

Although plenty of girls play hockey, I strongly believe that to many people, the sport is viewed as a normative narrative that hockey is a “guys sport”. It is seen as normal to have the men playing the rough sports such as hockey, while the women stay safe on the side just cheering them on while sipping on a soothing warm mocha. Hockey can obviously be a very rough and dangerous sport which is why many people think that women can’t handle it. However, seeing my sister play hockey with two other girls then the rest of her team all guys makes me proud that she can do what they can! Many women have proved that “women can do anything that a man can do” and hockey is just another one of those things. I think it is important to bust a myth such as this one and disrupt what is seen as “normal” within our society.