I was reflecting on why I started this page. It was started out of love, in the hope that something new would grow. In a lot of ways I’ve been successful in that endeavour. I am not the man that started writing funny fiction about his favourite hockey team. I have learned about myself and about my world. I spent a long time wondering why I even watch hockey since it gives nothing back to me. What I have landed on is that I enjoy watching it and I don’t question it beyond that. I won’t stop cheering for my favourite team, even if I don’t feel compelled to tell funny stories about them any more.

I do want to talk about them though, even if just to myself. Today (Oct 26 ‘24) they have a big game against the Bruins. I don’t have any plans to watch it because I am bored with the story already. Anyone who has spent any time healing from trauma knows that some patterns repeat themselves because we cannot imagine any other way. I believe that the Leafs are stuck in a pattern and I believe they are starting to see another way. The problem is that there is a large gap between understanding what you want to change and changing what you want to change.

I talk about the team as a singular entity because regardless of the myriad of parts, the Leafs are the Leafs. Some may disagree but I have watched this team for decades (plural) and the patterns are the same regardless of the variable details. What I watched in their last win (v. Tampa) was what the Leafs want to be. It was amazing and beautiful, the radical imposition of their will upon an opponent who could not answer. They showed me that they have a game we have never seen. Then they stopped. The patterns reverted to the old familiar.

Maybe that’s why I want to avoid tonight’s game. I am moving out of old patterns, I am shedding old pain. I don’t want to watch my favourite team stuck in their old ways. Still I cannot deny that a part of me wants to watch for that exact reason. I want to watch my favourite team destroy the barriers in their own minds and be the best Leafs there have ever been. I see the potential. But I’ve been hurt so many times. My hope has taken so much abuse. At what point is it my own fault for setting myself up.

So I won’t watch tonight and my deepest hope is that I regret the choice. I may change my mind between the morning, as I write this, and the evening to come. I’m allowed to change my mind. I’m allowed to choose what feels best in the moment. I’m allowed to trust my instincts to know what’s best in the moment. It took me a long time to believe that.

I think the Leafs are starting to believe in themselves but the journey isn’t a straight line. Mental health is not a linear path to walk and no two minds walk the same. If I could give the Leafs all the power of my hope I would. If all my faith could demolish all their fears I would give it freely. But it wouldn’t work.

Just like the Leafs winning or losing will not make my life more or less fulfilled. My joy and strength come from inside, it cannot be shaken because it has been earned. The Leafs are finding their joy, earning their strength. It can be painful to watch struggles that you cannot ease. With all the love in my heart I will allow myself some respite from that pain. it doesn’t mean I don’t think they will win. It means I choose myself.

I Be Leaf.