Five Thoughts for a Friday: Five Long Years

Time Flies

File it under "Life Comes at you Fast" folks. I hadn't realized it until attending Hollerado's first Ottawa show in five years that I also just passed my five years' probation here at Silver Seven. I think now I'm allowed to sneak in two curse words per article per article and also start plugging my MLMs on the site but I'll have to double-check with corporate. The Sens haven't gotten any better at making the playoffs since I started here and I think my writing has gotten worse but enough about me, let's talk about my favourite hockey team that I love to hate.

Always the optimist's bridesmaid

Even with so much anguish around the Ottawa Senators and their familiar November antics, I find myself enjoying the Andlauer era with renewed vigor that I certainly didn't have five years ago. As much as I can appreciate the dire implications of missing the playoffs for the eighth consecutive season, I still find it so refreshing that this team has no longer has dirty laundry hanging out to dry in the eye of the public. Give me on-ice futility every day of the week. Why are you picking up rotten tomatoes?

Perspective

To that effect (and I acknowledge the extent to which it must seem that I love to eat from the hand that I used to bite), I also take a lot of solace in Ottawa's very vanilla arena negotiations especially when reading the latest MLB discussions around Tampa after Oakland just lost their team. I know Canada operates a little differently with public funding, and I know that the NHL and our new ownership group will keep the Sens in Ottawa. It just feels like between all the recent NFL relocations and now many MLB teams close behind, I should thank someone I'm not a Coyotes fan.

Accountability

I also really appreciated Steve Staios' attempts to reassure the fanbase on Thursday because I think after so many years of incompetence with the previous regime, we just want to know that this new management group has a plan and a vision and operates with some level of transparency. For years it felt like despite all the on-ice failures, the organization didn't see any flaws in the construction of the roster despite the glaring nature of said flaws. It probably sucks as a GM having to publicly acknowledge that you just traded for a goalie and signed him to a massive extension that has soured in a matter of weeks (like Staios, I imagine Linus Ullmark will sort it out given his track record). Staios also has to answer for a coach he just hired. So, yeah, I appreciate the transparency. When subbing Jacob Bernard-Docker for Travis Hamonic constitutes a headline, you realize how trivial our new struggles look in comparison to previous years.

Hobbies

I know from many years of experience how easily one can dwell on every single loss (and when your team loses more than 40 games per season that means sometimes spending ten percent of your calendar year weeping in your breakfast cereal). It stinks having to wait days for your team to have a shot at redemption (and knowing they may very well lose that game too). And with that in mind, I just want to emphasize how badly we all need time away from the Ottawa Senators. Loving this team means distancing yourself from them every chance you get. I love the Ottawa Senators (probably to an unhealthy degree) and I have countless hobbies that, if nothing else, help me forget the losses from the nights before, and live in the present instead of always looking forward to the next soul-crushing loss. Keep reading the site, but also remember to get outside sometimes.