Bittersweet summer vacation

Tonight was the last Ice Maidens class for the season. For those of yinz who don't know, I help teach a women's learn-to-play ice hockey class on Sunday nights for a good part of the year. (For those of yinz who do know...and are women...I've probably tried to sign you up. Hehe...)

The Ice Maidens program is by far one of the most rewarding things I have ever done, helping people learn a sport that can seem so inaccessible if you don't know where to look, especially for women. My absolute favorite moment is after we scrimmage at the end of the first class of each session, seeing the excited faces of women who just played ice hockey for the first time ever. I enjoy every unique person who comes through that class, and get a serious high every time someone learns something new or tackles another obstacle.

So the last class is always a little sad because I know it will be months before I get to experience these things again, but at the same time, I know it's a necessary break. Thoughts necessarily turn to summer things like baseball, biking, and skin open to the sun rather than covered by pounds of gear. And, the breaks from things that we enjoy help keep them fresh. When you truly love something, it is definitely a case of absence making the heart grow fonder, and not of out of sight out of mind.

So it's a bittersweet summer vacation. I know come the fall I will return with fresh vigor to happily pick on the people who I can tell haven't skated in three months.

This year, of course, had a little more meaning in that Cara, the head instructor for the class, is leaving for the snowier climes of upstate New York. Enough cannot be said for what Cara has done for this program, and I only hope that Stacy and I and whoever else is involved can keep that momentum going. Truly, women's hockey in Pittsburgh owes a great debt of gratitude.