So I was obliged to wear the Maple Leafs sweater. When I arrived on the rink, all the Maurice Richards in red, white, and blue came up, one by one, to take a look. When the referee blew his whistle I went to take my usual position. The captain came and warned me I’d be better to stay on the forward line. A few minutes later the second line was called; I jumped onto the ice. The Maple Leafs sweater weighed on my shoulders like a mountain. The captain came and told me to wait; he’d need me later, on defence. By the third period I still hadn’t played; one of the defencemen was hit in the nose with a stick and it was bleeding. I jumped on the ice; my moment had come! The referee blew his whistle; he gave me a penalty. He claimed I’d jumped on the ice when there were already five players. That was too much! It was unfair! It was persecution! It was because of my blue sweater! I struck my stick against the ice so hard it broke.

• from Roch Carrier’s “The Hockey Sweater,” The Hockey Sweater and Other Stories (1979)

(Images: The Hockey Sweater sculpture (c. 1989) by Jean Matras, from the collection of Library and Archives Canada, was part of the Canadian Museum of History’s 2017 exhibition “Hockey in Canada: More Than Just a Game.”)