Mr. Zamboni

It doesn’t take a poet or a hockey fan to appreciate the innate love people get from a Zamboni gliding across the ice.

Who doesn’t love the Zamboni? Foreigners? I don’t know. I don’t think so. Hating the Zamboni wouldn’t be un-American, and it wouldn’t be un-Canadian either, but it would be something damn close to it- It would be un-Human. And unheard of.

Even if you aren’t a hockey fan, or a winter sports fan, or a warm blooded human being, the Zamboni will make you a fan of something more important, a fan of the ice. Everyone can love the ice, the way skates feel, the tight strain around your feet and ankles, painful and protective, so much love that it hurts like a Christmas hug from a fat aunt, or a thanksgiving dinner that aches and fills more than it tastes, or a handshake from your father when you both know you’ve just done something utterly amazing. Ice is perfect- it’s cold, but it isn’t sterile, and the molecule aren’t bound tightly closed but are instead held together with open arms, embracing each other lovingly.

The Zamboni can make you a fan of ice, of the cold, of the winter and Canada. Zambonis are so damn gorgeous. They are everybody’s friends. They’re a source of comfort. People watch Zambonis go around and around ice rinks, mesmerized, enthralled, watching a childhood mobile that’s larger than life. In those large rinks time and space are transformed and people are lifted away from this world, and enter into someplace where the national anthem isn’t about a war but is still patriotic, where having an American flag and a Canadian flag hang side by side just seems right, where white scaffolding isn’t a sign of industry, and clean air isn’t just a Canadian selling point. Hockey rinks, excuse me, Ice rinks, aren’t magic, they’re just nice, and they make other things nice too. In an ice rink, the ice isn’t hard, but dependable, the air isn’t cold, but crisp and still, and the energy isn’t lost, it’s just stored away, like the sun is inside Superman, in people, waiting to be let out, to burst out, to shoot out blades and dance on the ice, gliding over everything, to sing out of mouths like god singing the universe into existence, hanging in the emptiness of space a beautiful cloud, fleeting and energetic, singing the body electric.

Raw ice is great-ice in the wild, untamed, the kind that’s always rough but has kind snow banks to catch you- but ice in a rink is a whole different world. The ice rink is its own nation, its diplomat the Zamboni, a king and a commoner with duel citizenship. And even in writing this I can’t tell if in my soul I’m a Canadian or an American. I guess I’m neither and I’m both. I’m a Michigander; and I’m a kid, and I like to skate, and I’ll always love to watch the Zamboni work its magic and do its thing.

Does every ice rink have two flags in it? Or is that a Michigan thing?

The Zamboni should be our state Mascot. Or at least Canada’s. They’re like Teddy bears or best friends, and they do what Roosevelt did for this country and what best friends do for us: They pick us up, brush us off, wiping away the tears and the blood, scaring over our cuts and softening our bruises, they set us back on your feet looking like we’re something new, something still amazing, even when we’ve been through hell, even when we aren’t much. The Zamboni comes in when everything is cut and torn and wrecked to hell and cleans it up, smoothes over all the bad parts and leaves the ice fresh again. The Zamboni gives everyone a little more faith. At a concert you cheer for an encore and hope to get one, at a hockey game you cheer for the Zamboni and know you’ll get it.

It’s always there, The Zamboni, that last glorious player, taking his victory lap for all of us, all of the skaters that have been there before, and all those skaters that’ll be there again.

What’s so great about the Zamboni? I consider myself a poet and a hockey fan and a Michigander, and I still can’t answer that question properly. It’s great because an Italian guy from Utah built it. It’s great because it has two seats for a one man job. It’s great because it’s one occupation everyone can respect, the way janitors and schoolteachers and prophets should be respected but aren’t. It’s great because it’s a part of hockey. It’s great because it’s as hard to understand and as easy to love as Curling. And it’s great because everyone always waits for it, and watches it out there all alone; doing a good clean well needed job for all of us.

Thank you Mr. Zamboni.
Long live Lord Stanley.
And go Wings.

-Caleb, Michigander.