Our roving reporter, doing the rounds at the InterContinental and Hesperia hotels, warns the general public of false Gretzkys and Sittlers.
If you happen to see a 160-centimeter-tall fellow who weighs 90 kg wearing a sweater that says GRETZKY on the back, check his face. Or a skinny, redheaded guy with acne in a sweater that says SITTLER. Most likely, he’s either a conman or a superfan of said player.
In Canada and the US, you can buy hockey stars’ sweaters at supermarkets, and not only have some people done just that, they also wear them in public.
Imagine all the disappointments taking place in discos. A young lady at a sensitive age may believe she’s just hit it off with a hockey star who turns out to be a Canadian engineer. For example.
— Helsingin Sanomat, April 27, 1982

When the big outdoor rink opened just a ten-minute walk from our apartment building, I was an enthusiastic second-year hockey player in fourth grade. That was my second year in organized hockey, playing on a real team with real sweaters, that is.

I had been into hockey a lot longer than that, because Dad played in the lower divisions in Finland. And ever since I had been to a Helsinki IFK game at the Helsinki Arena and witnessed hockey goalies in real life, Dad had made me a beautiful cardboard mask, which he spray-painted black. I can still smell the fresh paint when I think back to that gorgeous piece of hockey equipment.

At our first game, the coaches handed out the green sweaters, and there was something magical about it. In my mind, it transformed me from just a guy into a player, so our coach might as well have been handing out Superman’s capes to us.

But he didn’t. He handed out a moss-green sweater with yellow letters across the chest, and on my sweater, a letter A. I had no idea what it meant, so I asked my buddy – the same boy who had told me about the opportunity to join a hockey team – about it.

“It means that you’re the assistant captain. I’ve got the C, so that means I’m the captain,” he said matter-of-factly.

“Oh, nice,” I said.

The coach heard it and promptly downgraded our superhero statuses to “basic level.”

For the past few years – maybe even ten – Daughter and I have hit the big outdoor ice on Christmas Eve. Sometimes Wife and Son join us, but since hockey isn’t their thing, most often it’s just the two of us.

And 200 others.

Unlike in 1980s Finland, many – if not most – of them are wearing the sweaters of their favourite teams and players. Many of them from the National Hockey League, but there are always some from the Swedish league, and then there are those who go for the vintage style.

They go to the basement and dig up their old hockey sweater: the one that doesn’t quite fit them anymore, even though they no longer have to squeeze any equipment under it; that old sweater that makes middle-aged dads smile out of nostalgia because the team no longer exists, or if it does, it now toils far below the top division.

The one that tells others that they are not new to the game of hockey. No, sir, they’ve played a game or two in their time.

At the time of its construction, our rink was the biggest outdoor arena in Europe, with a full-size speed-skating track going around the full-size bandy rink. Not that I knew it then, nor did I care. All I needed was a corner of that huge ice, some snow or hats for goalposts, and a few guys to play with.

I’d come home from school, do my homework – that was the rule – and if there was time before Mom and Dad came home from work, I’d throw my skates and gloves in a bag, grab a stick, and walk up the hill to the rink to look for a game.

On my way, I passed the soccer pitch where I had been skating as an even smaller kid, before the artificial ice. Between the street, the soccer pitch, and the track, a small path led toward the new rink, and once I got through there, I could already see the bright lights and even hear one of the most beautiful sounds I know.

A skate cutting through ice and the puck hitting the blade of a stick.

I’d rush through the doors, put my skates on, and run out to the ice. Sometimes I’d find a classmate out there, and with any luck, they’d already be playing a game, and I’d have my in.

If not, I’d have to hang around for a while and do some scouting—evaluate the level of play—then maybe fetch a few loose pucks to show off my skating, look for the right moment, and then say the magic words: “Can I join?”

According to outdoor hockey rules, the answer is yes, no matter how young or small you may be. There’s always a place for you. And once the game continues, no one cares about your age or skills or size. You just throw yourself into the game and let it carry you.

Now, it’s not like I didn’t pay any attention to the other players. I did. Especially a few years later, when I graduated to the hockey rink outside the big rink. Faster pace, tougher play, more sweater guys.

I loved to play against the sweater guys. Since there were no sweaters for sale in stores, anyone with one was certainly a player – or, more often, a wannabe player – and nothing made them more furious than a pint-sized kid outskating them, or deking them out of their skates.

That was a big deal. After all, they did wear hockey sweaters. Nothing could top that, except maybe getting a tap on the shoulder from the sweater guy on my team.

When Daughter and I go for our Christmas skate, we do wear sweaters. Call it a generational gap, but she wants to do it, so I play along.

I’ve worn Team Finland sweaters, a Valeri Kharlamov national-team sweater, and an Edmonton Oilers sweater a friend of mine bought when he was in Canada with the under-20 national team. (He was a real player.)

This year, Daughter went for a Team Canada sweater I had got her from a hockey conference earlier that year, but I decided to surprise her. I dug up my sweater from my second team, from the time when I walked up the hill to the huge ice rink looking for a game. The one that Mom had made smaller for me, but without losing the advertisement on the back. That was important, because it made the sweater feel real.

The sleeves were a little short, and the fit was a little tight, but not too bad, I thought.

I walked downstairs to show it to Wife and Daughter.

They laughed.

I went back up and changed.

I had become a sweater guy.