Laker Hockey Players Victorious in Maccabiah Games

By: Jordan Johnston
7/30/2013 11:30AM

Recently two members of the Lake Superior State hockey team headed to Israel to compete in the 19th Maccabiah (English: Maccabi) games. The Maccabiah games are all Jewish sporting competitions that are held every four years. Often referred to as “The Jewish Olympics,” the Maccabiah games are based off the story of Maccabi whose story has become synonymous with courage, success, and victory. Major emphasis is placed on the importance of the State of Israel in the lives of Jewish people from across the world. Uniting close to ten thousand Jewish people from all across the globe, the Maccabiah games are a significant event in the lives of many Jewish people. Seniors, Zach Sternberg and Dan Radke, were chosen to represent Canada on their men’s open hockey team. After sweeping preliminary competition including a 15-0 win over Team Israel, Team Canada took the gold medal defeating Team USA 7-1. According to the Maccabiah Canada website, Dan Radke tallied 6 total points during competition with 2 goals and 4 assists. Zach Sternberg also totaled 6 points with 6 assists. Radke and Sternberg return to Canada on July 31st and will continue preparing for the 2013-2014 Laker Hockey season. There is no doubt that their experience in the Maccabiah games will help prepare them for the upcoming season in the all new WCHA. For more information on Maccabi Canada visit: www.maccabihockey.com. For more information on the 19th Maccabiah games and complete game recaps visit: www.maccabiah.com.

Let Us

We can speak without saying anything. Listen to me. Look into my eyes and listen. Do you hear that? I’m screaming out the truth so you can finally understand what you need to know. Even in the dark our eyes search and find. Hands clasped in the darkness. I can feel your pulse race. I can feel your smile dance across your face. Would this truth kill the light if spoken out loud? Would you be surprised to find that in these moments entangled in each other I’ve found freedom? You pulled and pulled while I pushed and pushed and now here we are wrapped in heady silence that threatens to kill me. If I whispered would I steal your breath away? Would you grasp for oxygen with your hands that are tangled up in mine? Would the truth coat your lungs like thick black smoke and leave you coughing to expel it? Or, would it be the breath you need to finally dive deep into this partnership of hearts? Would we sink into ecstatic bliss they write about in the songs that make me think of you? Oh my dear silly little boy oh that you knew you were. You speak yet say nothing, what of that? Your eyes discourse and I will answer. I slip into Shakespeare so easily when you are around. Let us not be star crossed lovers that rip apart the hearts of young girls while they read our tale. Let this not be a story that I read on rain soaked nights and memorize the words. Let this be the song that pulls the lyrics from my lips before I even know the chords. The melody that lulls me to sleep on countless nights no longer alone in my bed or in my heart. Oh just listen to the truth that seeps from my eyes like tears on the night I thought you were abandoning me. I’m screaming to you. I’m pleading with you. Let me stand close to you and hint at truths with my vocabulary I’ve saved just for you. Do you know? Oh god I think you know. Tell me you know so that I can finally say it out loud. No more beseeching with my eyes. No more key strokes with words I’ll never let you see. Let me say it. Let you read it. Let us feel it. Let me, let you, let us. 

An Abyss of Unspoken Truths

The ghost ship slips slowly through the river. If not for its lights it would not exist on this cold northern night. The river ripples softly reacting to the intrusion. Everything remains silent. The stars sparkle in pity for the girl on the banks. They see it all. They know it all. Here she is with words unspoken on her lips and a year of regret to reflect upon. If not for the sound of the breath that shakes she would not exist on this sad northern shore. The moon looks down upon the scene and wonders if the girl that basks in his glow will ever learn to glow for herself. It knows her greatest secret. The truth locked in her heart refusing to part from her lips. The moon knows her greatest fear. Another denial to the life she longs to live. He’s watched her push and pull the silly boy who might be crazy enough to save her. She silently counts the minutes off her life as she takes another drag from the things she was supposed to give up. She’s a paradox of life. Refusing to hold what will save her and failing to reject the things that kill her. She denies herself no punishment for the crimes of which she continuously charges herself with. Much like the moon and stars that look upon her, she would be nothing if she did not shine. Shine upon her people that look at her in wonder. How can she, much like a star, shine so bright yet stay so far away? How can she, much like the moon, push and pull the tides of others while never showing her entire being? The aves of the river avoid her bench. They smell the toxins that seep from her pores. She will ruin them just as she has ruined herself. She takes the beautiful and the bold and breaks their wings so that they may not fly above her wall and enter her garden of forget me nots. She saw a chance for salvation from herself and with her fear and aggression she pushed it far away. Silly boy, had forgotten that he must bring a shield into this battle. The ghost ship slips slowly around the bend. If not for the sound of the water falling into the rocks one would not know it had ever been. The stars dim in frustration for the girl that had prayed for their guidance. No star, no compass can guide the one who’s truly lost. On the banks of this sad northern shore she whispers bated apologies the hero does not want to hear. The moon looks down and sighs for the girl who compared her love to him. Her greatest secret sinks into the river. An abyss of unspoken truths that she can never tell. 

Gains made in the "year of loss." A look back on 2012.

I’d be lying if I said 2012 treated me well. The tail end of 2011 was a slow tragedy leading into the sadness that surrounded 2012. I remember arriving at my parents house only to turn around and return to the Soo because a friend of mine was dealing with personal tragedy. I sat across from him at my kitchen table and we talked about death and sadness lingered in the air. Meanwhile around that time we put Gramps in hospice care. Mortality is a terrifying side effect of life. I suppose it was no surprise, if I’m being honest Gramps had been dying a slow death for years, but the impending doom of death hung in the air twisting and flashing amongst the twinkling Christmas lights we’d hung in his room. I knew when I kissed him on the forehead the night before I left for Ohio that I would probably never see him again, and I didn’t. Shortly after the beginning of the new year he closed his eyes for the final time and finally he was free of pain. It was both heartbreaking and relieving in one fell swoop. I dearly loved—love my Grandfather, but for as long as I can remember he’d been sad.  There was a sadness in his heart that came from losing my Grandmother to cancer when she was so young, and to then later in life lose his old friend, soulmate, and wife to another form of cancer. So when he finally slipped away I felt selfishly sad and comforted in knowing that perhaps he was reunited with the women that he so dearly missed. It was a rough way to begin a new year, but my heart was healing and I was moving on. Then, tragedy struck again, this time unexpectedly. My only surviving Grandmother was a force of nature. My father’s mom was a woman that greatly shaped me into the person that I am today. She was a lover of life, a zealot when it came to laughter, and a true angel walking on earth. She was 89 years old with more spunk and life in her than most kids my age. But, in one fell swoop life caught up with her, just short of 9 decades of life she suffered a stroke. She held on for a week and then the last of my grandparents silently left this earth. She was much older than my Grandfather on my mom’s side of the family, but her death was the surprising one of the two. I sat on the stool and listened as my mom took the call from my dad as he whispered the news I had hoped wouldn’t come. I left minutes later to drive back to my home in the Soo and in that hour long drive I mourned the loss of two grandparents. I was overcome with a new felt sadness for Grandma Marnie, my mom’s mother. The woman I never met. I cried for Grandma Connie, my mom’s stepmom and a woman I barely remember. I choked back sobs over the loss of Pa, my dad’s father and a man I was robbed of at a such a young age. There was a sudden realization that I had reached the point in my life where I no longer had grandparents. Tears streamed down my cheeks as I thought of my parents, now parentless and I was filled with unbridled terror over the thought that I too would someday have to live without my parents. I cursed and I screamed and I cried as I drove north on I-75. This was the start of my year and already I had had enough. I wished the year away.

As Spring broke we said our final goodbyes to Gram in a funeral service filled with both tears and laughter. I was glad for the laughter, because I knew Gram would have wanted it that way. Summer slowly crept in and a clash of family schedules postponed Gramps’ memorial. I spent all Summer slowly but surely healing. I knew I owed it to my Grandparents to pick my heart up off the floor, dust it off, and move on. In the early Fall we gathered on a boat to send Gramps’ off for one last sail on the water. As we sprinkled his ashes into the lake that holds so much meaning to my mother’s family I choked back tears and read the poem that always meant so much to him. It was the final chapter in the year of loss for me.

As Fall dragged on I was filled with a feeling of new beginnings. Fall has always been special to me, I was born in the Fall, and something about the crisp air, the leaves whispering in the winds, and the beautiful sunsets have always moved me. I’ve always believed that with loss comes gain and I was on the brink of gaining new members of my family. For me family has always been about love, not blood. Family to me is a strong sense of connection to another human being, an undying love and appreciation for someone that finds themselves deeply enclosed in the crevices of your heart. I found my new family members in a place that has always been a beacon of hope and happiness in my life. I met two of my dearest friends—sisters in that place. The motto I’ve always had in regards to our friendship is “all I had to do was turn around.” They’d been standing behind me as I stood in front of the glass for months and suddenly I turned around and our friendship was born. That same magic happened again this year. I turned around and looked around and found a whole new group of people. A friendship forged through a shared passion for hockey, slightly warped senses of humor, and a need for family whilst away from the ones we already called family. Those people have been the saving grace for the year of 2012. Suddenly a year that had made me feel so alone suddenly made me feel supported. Though I do not know these individuals as well as I would personally like to, our times together have made me smile and laugh during a year I was sure would only be filled with tears.

As I sit on the brink of a brand new year I can’t help but be hopeful. Though with these new friends came a specific person that made me shed tears for a form of heartbreak I’m all too familiar with, I wouldn’t never wish them away. They have given me what I so desperately needed, a feeling of family. Though these people and this bond can never replace the Grandparents I’ve lost this year, they can help heal the sadness that came from that loss. I can only cling to them and the memories we create as I finish up the last moments in the town I’ve loved and lived in for over half a decade. I can tuck them safely in the crevices of my heart and keep them with me even when I finally leave this place. I shudder to think what this year would have been had I not met them. For a girl that avoids using words like fate and destiny I can’t help but think that I was meant to still be here and a searching for family because it was in the year of loss that I gained so very much. 

The Story of a Lighthouse and a Ship

I remember the first moment I saw him. Something deep inside me screamed. A loud earth-shattering scream that vibrated through my entire body. His smile. Oh, his smile. It was like a lighthouse guiding, drawing me in after years of floating out at sea. That first night, everyone could see it in my eyes. A new light, slowly seeping into my hazel eyes, my heart was awake. That first night we spent in my sacred temple. I forgot to say my prayers because I was, in that moment all consumed. He stood so near and I could feel his warmth. I could hear the bells in the distance or perhaps it was a ringing from the blood rushing to my face. Then he made me laugh. He made me throw my head back and laugh the way my Grandmother taught me how. It echoed off the ceiling and he smiled. I made him laugh. A deep laugh working its way from his toes to the ceiling. It circled through the air and encompassed me. It lit up the part of my heart I had promised to let remain dark. His eyes, the way they danced to the sound of our jokes, lost in a melody no one but us two could appreciate. That first moment, first night, I was so sure it was the start of many…and it was.

I remember the first night he let me entangle myself in him. We sat close, too close for friends. We shared whispers and secrets. I snuck a glance, and he was looking back. Our eyes locked and we stared at each other. Something so comfortable about the discomfort of looking into each other’s windows of the soul. I smiled and he whispered “What?” and I knew there was no reason for that question—he knew. Our bare arms touched and sparks ignited in the dimly lit room and I shook from both fear and excitement. Who was I in that moment, but a young girl on the verge of something she thought wasn’t possible? I asked the stars for more moments like that and they gave me what I needed.

I remember the way it felt to fold into him. He shifted and twisted so that I could lie beneath his sun. My fingers stretched to get lost within his hair and he tilted his head and I believed. I danced with my friends on back porches making more wishes on the stars of Northern Michigan and they smiled. Something was starting, and like a wildfire spreading through my veins I burned with hope. I was sure, I’d never been so sure. The girl that swore destiny was a lie that people told themselves started whispering words such as fate and the stars twinkled.

I remember the first sick twisted shred of doubt as it crept into my mind. I remember crying in front of the people I loved and them telling me hope was not lost. The same twinkle that danced within my eyes was there within his. I confided in my brothers that my heart was falling and they held me and told me that I deserved this feeling. My captain took my hand and told me I was beautiful and meant to be loved. I believed. I set timeframes and created opportunities to bring him to me. I reached out and touched the flame and came out unscathed. I was sure. They were sure. It was only a matter of time—or so I thought.

I remember the night he shattered the last beating corner of my heart. I stood within my temple and he softly whispered venom in my ear and I nodded my head like an obedient child. There is no such thing as fate. This silly girl should have known. My Irish blood craved escape within a bottle and I drank. I forced laughter to my face while my friends saw the broken bits of glass in my eyes. I sat on tables and sang silly songs and he watched. He tuned in to watch the show that he was directing and my past whispered lines for me to say. I escaped to a cold porch and looked up to find no stars. He asked me questions and I gave him truths he wasn’t ready to hear. We murmured false apologies that neither of us meant and I bled out in front of him.

I remember lying in bed replaying moments and analyzing footage. Something deep inside me screamed again, this time the scream was blood curdling pain. I refused to run aground in front of his lighthouse, I refused to let the shore rip my ship apart. He refused to push me away so I answered his muted calls. I catered and pined and clung to the hope, my friends, brothers, and captain had given me. I clung to the hope that swelled when his golden browns reflected in my hazels. The longer that I looked the more the stars laughed.

I remember giving. Letting little pieces of the broken glass fall into his hands thinking the heat from his body would meld them into something solid again. Like lightning striking sands on the shores of Lake Superior I thought he could meld my tiny pieces into a beautiful sculpted mess. But though the thunder rolled the lightning never struck. In a last ditch effort for salvation I rained upon him and he pulled on his raincoat and turned away.

I remember giving in and giving up. I swept the broken glass into my pocket and slowly turned away. Salt water poured from my eyes and I let it fall to the ground. I pulled anchor and slowly turned back out into the dark December seas. I set a course for anywhere but here and I looked for the stars. The stars that promised and then laughed had disappeared. A cold winter of the soul had settled in and the clouds covered the sky. The compass that had spun in his direction was now cracked and broken and tossed into the waves. I turned one last time to see if his lighthouse was still shining and though I could see its outline in the distance its light had burned out. I sailed into the dark without him ever knowing the life changing goods I had come to deliver. They stayed wrapped up in tattered boxes within the hull of my ship waiting for a lighthouse keeper with courage to shine for me.

Penny's Grey.

Listen Along
Her name is Jordan. She’s been alive on this earth for over two decades. She’ll never win a beauty contest, her weight makes sure of that. She’ll never blend into a crowd, her hair makes sure of that. Those are the first two things you notice about her, her hair and her weight. But, then she starts talking. There’s a 90% chance that within the first moments of meeting her she will make you laugh. She’s got a sharp Irish tongue, she exudes false confidence, and she laughs when anyone is watching. She’s passionate, or dear lord is she passionate. There is not much grey in her life, it’s love or hate, right or wrong, good or bad and she relishes in the extreme. When she commits to belief it takes over her soul. She is forever trying to keep it positive when it comes to other people. She wants them to feel loved. She wants them to feel like she would do anything to support them, because she would. She wants to be a P.R. maven and help the people of the world fall in love with the people she already loves. In the decades she’s been alive she’s perfected the art of loving other people. With no holding back, with no shame, she loves. She wraps her loves in perfect blue paper and stores them deep inside the softness of her soul, forever careful to not let those people venture into the harden, bitter depths she hides from the world. Oh she’s jaded. Little parts of her soul have been blackened by her loving ways. She never learned to love herself. She thinks she’s ugly because others have told her so. She thinks she’s a lost cause because others have let her wander. She knows she’s heartbroken because she can’t feel it beating.  There is dead tissue left and it festers. It hides behind her eyes and she smiles.

Her name is Morgan and she is forever 21. No, no, not like the store. No, forever 21 in that she doesn’t age. She’s a young adult with a chip on her shoulder and a beer in her hand. She’s the protector. She comes around when Jordan can’t be seen. When the darkness creeps into Jordan’s eyes, Morgan hides Jordan away in a room with a book and a Hanson CD. Morgan doesn’t play games. She too does not believe in grey. It’s now or never with Morgan and if the answer is never she won’t bat an eyelash, she will simply walk away. Morgan drinks too much and she talks too much. Morgan will tell you things Jordan wouldn’t dare utter. She’ll give truth out like it’s candy on Halloween and she’ll laugh when your teeth rot.  At any given moment she will spew all of Jordan’s secrets and let them leak into your ocean like an oil tanker run aground. She’ll start off quietly passive aggressive and then shift into full blown aggression. She doesn’t like when Jordan gets hurt, because then she has to make an appearance and it’s not the kind of appearance she likes to make. She likes command performances on the stages of bars and townhouses making people laugh, complaining about the music, and blowing people’s minds with her unbridled drunken dysfunction. She likes to be a good time, she doesn’t like to be the center of a bad time. But, she will be, she’ll make your night the worst you’ve ever had if she has to. She’s the fury and the storm and she talks.

Her name is Penny. She has no age, just an old soul. She’s quiet, poetic, and kind. She’s shy in the worst times and can only ever express herself through art. She loves music, she lives inside a melody, and she’s sure every song she hears was written just for her. She’s the kind of girl you could fall in love with.  She’ll hold you as tightly as possible while you fall apart and she’ll cry tears over your pain. If you need her she will entangle herself with you and you won’t know if the tears on your cheek are hers or your own. Penny will write you songs. She will immortalize you with the swift movement of a pen or the click of fingers on a keyboard. She won’t be the one to make you laugh. Jordan and Morgan have monopolized that venture, laughter is their defense. Penny has no defense. Penny is the heart on the sleeve left for the elements of life to erode away. But, she never fades, she just quietly creeps back inside until the storm has passed. Then she’ll process it. Penny will take Jordan’s heartbreak and Morgan’s drunken mistakes and she will make something of them. She will be the one to find the moral at the end of the story and say the things the other girls don’t want to hear. She is honest, she cannot, will not lie. She will tell the others that she loves him and the others have no choice but to listen and to love. She will create the playlist of sad songs and make Jordan and Morgan feel something they don’t want to feel. Like Morgan, she never likes to see Jordan hurt, but she won’t pretend it didn’t happen.  She lives in the grey the other two claim don’t exist. She knows nothing is clear cut so she thinks and she feels. She will over analyze a situation until every moment has been gone over and then she will talk about it some more. She is the hurt and the pain and she feels.

They are three girls. Three completely messed up sides to the same person. They go through life taking turns so that not every side is seen at once. Jordan’s broken soul hidden by love and laughter take center stage. Morgan makes appearances and her fury leads to conversations most people don’t want to have. Penny tries to never show  her face, she lies hidden in prose and teardrops. But, all three of them fell for him. It was a general consensus  that this boy was different, he laughed at Jordan’s jokes and looked into her eyes even as the darkness crept. He sat next to Morgan while she gave her performance, he listened to her fury, and he didn’t run away. But Penny, she liked him best. He stirred within her that quiet, peaceful warmth, that had long been forgotten. He had side stepped the other two and he looked Penny in the eyes, he saw her, he’s the only one that’s ever actually seen her. But he hurt them. He told Jordan the words she couldn’t handle hearing again. He forced Morgan to step out and drink and laugh and then he forced her to truth and she gave it to him. But, Penny, he hurt her the worst. He denied her the chance she’s been waiting on since the moment she looked at him. She was going to be the best she’d ever been for him, she was going to forget the hurt and feel and write and sing and dance and love. Now, here they are again, all three huddled around the computer while Jordan pretends like it’s no surprise, Morgan smokes her millionth cigarette, and Penny types and she cries. Tomorrow they will all go back out into the world as one to smile, to talk, and to feel, lost in Penny’s grey. 

I Have No Title

She sat in a dark room, with music playing, an empty pack of cigarettes had fallen at her feet. Her fingers brushed across the keyboard so swiftly the text struggled to keep up. She was poised for the anger, she knew it had to come. It always follows the sadness. She screamed for the anger and she shook with the need to feel the fury. She’d learned this lesson before, if you can get to the anger the hurt stops. Yes, she’d learned this lesson before. She was a self-taught genius in the world of hurt. She once joked that she’d write a book. It’s cute how they really thought she was joking. No, she could write a book, she should write a book. Something with a catchy title like “He’s just not that into fat girls” or “They’ll always just want to be your ‘friend.’” It would fly off the shelves and women would laugh and relate and she’d be understood. Isn’t that what she was chasing? The ultimate understanding? She went over it again and again with everyone. She calculated her moves, she leaned her head, she looked him in the eyes. She hates looking into eyes, but she did. They all encouraged her. Oh how she loved when they smiled and said “he likes you.” Those little whispers about how adorable she is, they had no idea she could giggle. She had forgotten she could giggle. She gets lost in memories of the nights standing at the bottom of the stairs and her brother telling her she deserves this boy who makes her feel this way. Her old friend telling her she was beautiful and worth it and he’d be crazy to say no. They all kept whispering “go for it!” So she did. She moved closer and she lowered her voice and he leaned in to listen. That memory, god she can almost feel it’s warmth. So she cries. She’s sad today. It’s been a horrible week. It began with a verbal assault that included every possible hurtful thing in the world. She was violated, she’d lost trust, in a matter of seconds she had been hurt by a shower of verbal bullets and she barely pulled through. She thought she could prove the shooter wrong. She thought that she could survive it if she showed him the things he had said were lies. If she could be wanted he’d be proved wrong. But, he was right. A week later he was right and she was left with that knowledge. Perhaps that’s why she keeps avoiding eye contact with everyone. She’s the liar. She made them believe that she could have it this time. She tricked her friends into seeing the best sides of her and now they are left with this broken side of her. The side they've never seen. She’s so sorry. Every time she crys she just feels so sorry. She’s sorry to herself because no matter how much she hates herself today no one should have to feel this way. She’s sorry to her friends who don’t deserve to have to watch her cry. They shouldn't have to comfort her. She’s so sorry for him. She didn't mean to spill her heart out and make him feel guilty. That’s not fair and he doesn't deserve that. Most girls just move on right? She should move on, he said no. But, no always hurts. Especially because she only actually asks once every couple of years. She knows hurt, so she doesn't let it happen, but she fell this time. This time she opened up to people and she took direction, this time she thought she might actually have the shot. She ran the play over and over again in her head, she stops at the point, takes one last breath and shoots. But, she didn't even get the puck, she tapped the ice to let the world know she was ready to take her shot, and he denied her the shot. That shot could have won the game. It could have changed the entire season. So she’s sad because she missed her shot and that asshole was right about her. She’s sorry, sorry for herself because she’s starting to see a major pattern. She’s sorry to her friends, because she’s taking this way too hard and even she’s annoyed. And, she’s sorry to him, maybe she will be his friend, because he’s wonderful, and better to be friends with wonder than not know it all. She sits in her dark room and she types. She cries a little bit more because someone once told her “crying is not a sign of weakness, since birth it has always been a sign that you are alive.” She’s alive, she’s sad, but she’s alive. She’s not angry. He’s not angry that she cares too much how can she be angry that he doesn’t care. It’s a story she’s lived before and she’ll probably live it all over again. Because that shooter was right and until she can tell him he was wrong nothing will ever change.