On Frozen Blog

Business that brings me to Original Six cities is my favorite kind (save trips to Detroit), and I’m in Chicago this week. Weather is very much a weather vane in my life; among the 40 colleagues here with whom I met last week to discuss this trip, I was the only one who smiled at word that spring hadn’t yet arrived on the southwestern shores of Lake Michigan. It actually snowed here a bit last Monday night, if you can imagine. Many trees here are without leaves still, and so I won’t lift allergy medicine from my travel bag during my stay. I arrived Saturday, and the mercury hardly moved above 50, along with 20 mph gusts and strong at times rain. It was a nice backdrop from which to huddle in Miller’s Pub on Wabash St. and watch some NHL playoffs on a large flatscreen with a few puck sodas.

I’ll enjoy a warm, sunny spring day like the rest, and we had that here on Sunday, but there’s something about a novel re-immersion in hockey weather, at odds with the calendar, that warms my hockey heart. Even in May. Besides, we really didn’t have winter this winter in D.C.

I’m one of those hockey fans who believes it’s good for hockey to have all of the NHL’s Original Six franchises, save perhaps Toronto, healthy and vibrant and competitive. (Actually, as part of a realignment scheme that would largely reconstitute the Patrick Division, I’d like to see an Original Six division. A file for another day.) And the Chicago Blackhawks had been lagging behind on this front for a good solid decade. Had been. But Dollar Bill Wirtz is deceased, the Hawks started winning hockey games this past season — they took Detroit to the woodshed a number of times — Patrick Kane and Co. have this town talking hockey again, the big rink — sadly, tragically located well away from this great city’s heartbeat — was filled to the ceiling for a lot of winter, the home team’s games are back on TV, and perhaps like in Washington, hockey in a sports-competitive town may be set to take off in the hearts of the locals for a durable future.

On my very first trip to Chicago, many years ago, while strolling the shopping strip of Michigan Avenue, I happened upon a quaint boutique-sized shop called Hawk Quarters — an outlet whose merchandise was devoted exclusively to the Blackhawks. It was distinctive for its largesse of authentic team equipment and uniform wear. You wanted a pair of Denis Savard’s shin guards, or skates, Hawk Quarters had ‘em. The store had dozens of hangers of multi-colored, authentic practice sweaters, all of them with endearing stress markings about them. On Sunday I visited Hawk Quarters again, and I enjoyed the stop every bit as as much as my first.

For one thing, a full hour before the store opened at noon, there was a middle-aged, silver-haired Chicagoan standing before the store window, within which a large flat-screen TV was replaying, perfectly audibly, a months-old game from the regular season. He was following it intently, even conspicuously and loudly exhorting on his Hawks to prevail. Standing not quite near enough to him to be associated with his eccentricity, I thought to myself, you wouldn’t see this in Atlanta or Nashville or Raleigh. I also didn’t think I’d have seen it for preceding renditions of the Hawks.

Maybe it was wishful thinking on my part, but I thought the old geezer was where he was Sunday morning because he missed his fun-to-watch hockey team again. Offseasons do that to the devoted.

Inside, I was drawn to the authentics section, as before. But on this visit it seemed expanded. Scores of sticks. Rows of skates. Bins teeming with well-worn protective gear. And that fabulous array of practice sweaters. There were some new Reeboks, but I noticed many, many more of the old school Centre Ice set, cut and formed the way hockey sweaters were supposed to be: beautifully bulky. Leave it to an Original Six franchise, I thought, to still skate a contemporary hockey season in a hockey sweater that looks like a hockey sweater. At least during practice.

They looked so good, in fact, that I very nearly plunked down $100 for one. I took a real hard look at a selection of green practice sweaters bearing that distinctive Hawks’ logo and thought how well I’d fit in this town were I sipping St. Patty’s beers here in one next March 17. But I reasoned that while I love Chicago, I just don’t love the Hawks.

Another reason for my attachment to this little store in this sorta hockeytown is its exclusivity of product. During all of those very lean years of losing Hawk Quarters remained open and faithful to its team, never once jumping on MJ’s formidible marketing bandwagon. Or the always marketable, lovable Cubs. Or the rebuilt Bears. That’s a monogamy I admire.

After an indulgent visit I left Hawk Quarters Sunday afternoon for a sun-splashed walk along Lake Shore Drive, and I thought about the chances of the Capitals needing/supporting a devoted store of their own in their downtown. A heck of a lot of gear today is moved on line, making stores like Hawk Quarters perhaps archaic or antiquated. The Caps of course have never had one. There’s a devoted store to the team at Kettler, but that’s different from announcing one’s presence to the residents and tourists of a downtown. There’s something commendably civic-minded about such a site, I think — a sort of meeting place for the like of heart. I hope we see one one day soon.