What Have I Wrought?

A couple of Sundays ago, thanks to the generosity of my cousin and people she knows, I found myself sitting in the Club level at Verizon Center for the Caps-Senators game. The story that follows serves as a portal to look into my sad, superstitious little mind.

As Alex Ovechkin scored his second goal early in the second period against a Sens defense that was imploding before my very eyes, I had two related thoughts-there is plenty of time for Ovie to notch a hat trick and, if he does put up that third goal, I am close enough to consider tossing my hat to the ice as tradition dictates. Sure enough, midway through the period, Ovechkin fires a laser through the defenseman's skates and past the goalie for his hat trick goal. The crowd explodes from its seats (something I can't do as easily in the cheaper, narrower "Fat Guys Should Not Sit Here" seats that I'm normally relegated to in the upper deck). High fives are slapping, the foghorn is blaring and the music is wailing. Swept up in the moment I decide, for the first time in my hockey fan career, to toss my hat towards the ice. Great game, great moment to celebrate, right? Not exactly.

You see, the hat I casually tossed away was undefeated. (Here's where the sad, superstitious part comes in.) As soon as the hat left my hand I cursed myself for casting it aside in such a fleeting moment. Prior to this season, I hadn't seen the Caps win in person in a long time, maybe since the lockout. This season, however, I've been to four games and witnessed four victories. Never mind that the Caps have stunk for a couple seasons and this year they are one of the best home teams in the league, surely it is something my friends and I are doing to assure victory. After two victories I thought maybe it was my new Caps hat purchased in the off-season. After three victories I really started searching for common denominators. St4rbux, of Name Your Fear, had been to all three games, but wasn't at this fourth, Ottawa victory. Maybe, if I'm lucky, it is the jersey- t shirt combo that I "happen" to have worn to all four victories. Or maybe it's just me, lucky ol' me. No, that can't be right.

So, possibly, by tossing the hat I have doomed myself to see no more Caps victories in person this season. The first test will be two Fridays from now when I visit Verizon next. I apologize in advance to my seatmates. Unfortunately, if it was the hat, I have broken the victory spell. If they do win, I'll remain a slave to my other superstitions.

Two perhaps karmic sidenotes to the game:
1)My hat did not reach the ice from the club level, instead it clipped a little girl in the arm. She was not bothered in the least and her dad tossed the hat onward, but I felt about "this big". In terms of bothering a child at a Caps game it is only surpassed by my inadvertent insulting of Bobby Carpenter's son back in the 1990's.
2)I found out after the game that the hats scooped from the ice after hat tricks are left ,for a brief time, at a lost-and-found spot in the arena so the owners may reclaim them. This info would have been more useful were I not already off the Metro and in my car when I received it. Damn it.