The game was going to start in two hours and I couldn’t find my hockey skates and not one of my family members seemed to want to help, in fact they were being rather closed mouth on the topic of hockey skates and if I had not been in so much of a rush I would have stopped to wonder why.

I dashed around the house and looked for my hockey skates in the garage, in the car and even looked for my hockey skates in the kitchen where my parents were sipping on coffee and reading the Saturday paper. They didn’t even look up when I searched the room, which somehow infuriated me.

Can you help me look for my hockey skates I wailed at my mother? Normally she would be helpful and rush around for me but this time when I asked her to help me look for my hockey skates she just asked me if I had checked my room. I looked at her absolutely astonished and replied that of course I had looked for my hockey skates in my room that was the first place I had looked.

She shrugged her shoulders and then asked me if I was sure that I had brought my hockey skates home with me from practice the night before. I stood there with my mouth opening and closing, obviously aliens had kidnapped my mother and this was some sort of stand in.

I just walked away and rushed through the rest of the house looking for my hockey skates, I was the star player on the team and if I didn’t have my hockey skates it would be a disaster. My next stop was my sister Lisa’s room she is 6 and I really didn’t think my hockey skates were in her room but I thought I would look anyway – that is how desperate I was becoming.

Lisa was standing in the middle of the room and she was twirling to a music video that was playing very loudly on the television in her room. It took a few minutes to get her attention. I actually had to pick her up and turn off the video before she would even acknowledge my presence.

Put me down she screamed so I did, the kid has the lungs of an opera singer and the pitch of a police siren. I asked her if she had seen my hockey skates and she shook her head and said that she thought she had seen Darren my older brother with them the night before but she wasn’t exactly sure.

Mmmm I thought to myself why would Darren want my hockey skates, oh well time to check with him and hopefully he had my hockey skates as I needed to leave for the rink in 10 minutes so I had to find them and I had to find them now. I knocked on Darren’s door but no answer; I knocked again before I realized that he was probably at his part time job at the local supermarket.
I turned the knob on his door but the door wouldn’t open, it was locked and I couldn’t check Darren’s room. I was now convinced that my hockey skates must be in Darren’s room because I couldn’t find them anywhere else in the house so I decided that I would climb the tree outside his window (Darren’s room is on the second floor) and get into his room that way because he always leave his window open he is a bit of a fanatic for fresh air.

So I climbed the tree, not ever having been a great tree climber it took me a few moments, lots of scratches and one minor fall to the ground, which meant that I had to start all over again. Finally I was on the branch outside of the window and I could see the lace from my hockey skates hanging over the edge of the chair there they were the mystery of my hockey skates had finally been solved.

I clambered into the room and turned the chair around to grab the hockey skates and they were not there it was just the laces. I was stunned, I had been so sure that my hockey skates were on the chair that I just stood dumbly with the laces hanging from my fingers and tears forming in my eyes.

I didn’t know what to do. I heard my mother calling me from downstairs, it was time to go for the game and still no hockey skates, I guessed that I would just have to go and explain to my team that I couldn’t play the Championship game because I couldn’t find my hockey skates. I dragged myself downstairs and into the car, I felt sick and all the way to the rink I kept playing through my mind what I was going to say to my coach when I arrived at the locker rooms.

We were finally there and my parents went inside leaving me to make my own way to the locker rooms and my fate, no reason to be in a hurry I wasn’t going to play anyway. There was silence as I approached the locker room, which was strange as it was usually noisy with the guys getting ready for the game.

I turned the corner and saw a banner saying happy birthday to me and as everyone saw me they yelled surprise and handed me a big box. In my hurry that morning I had forgotten that it was my birthday and in the box was a brand new pair of hockey skates.