Life without the NHL?

I've been silent long enough about, and now I'm going to say what I think.

Have you ever seen one of those situations where two petulant children are fighting, and the parents catch them, and they each try to blame each other for "starting it?" That's what the lockout looks like to me. And like an angry parent, I say "I don't care who started it, just CUT IT OUT."

If they don't cut it out -and they probably won't, unless either the commissioner, or the head of the player's union loses his job over it - it's really simple. I will stop caring. I really, really will. I know I will, because I have started to stop caring already.

Those who know me, know I love the Leafs. And I watch the NHL a lot, and I'm a lover of the game. So what.

I love Georgian Bay, too, but I learned to live elsewhere. I loved my grandmother way more than I love the Leafs, and she's dead, God rest her soul, and I'm over it. I'm divorced: enough said about that. Besides my home town, I've left Montreal and Halifax, Costa Rica, India, Fiji, several jobs, 2 universities and a very intense little college behind. I'm okay. I've moved on.

In fact, half of this city has left their entire countries behind them... and everyone moves on.

This argument isn't even about something important like family, let alone geography, theology, history, or justice. It's not even about hockey. This is an argument about money among people who have too much of it. Cry me a frickin' river.

And don't try to tell me that national pride is at stake. National pride is what you see when players play for nothing, in the spirit of competition. It's not about the right to live like kings while the people who really pay the bills go without seeing a game for their entire lives because they can't afford to get into the rink.

Real hockey continues, in driveways, on ponds and rivers, and in the hearts of people who love it, love to watch it, love to play it. That won't go away. And if the rest of it does, because a bunch of millionaires couldn't solve a childish argument, I'm sorry to say it deserves to die.

I sure don't want to see my friends who work in the industry lose their jobs. And I don't want to go without playoff fever or the easy camaraderie that comes watching a game in a bar. And I really wanted the Leafs to win the Cup, and I still hope they will, and soon. I'd rather these grown-up kids work it out. But I'm not confident they will. And if they don't, can anyone tell me why I should care? Why should anyone?

Life without the NHL? Whatever. I'll get over it. We all will.