Summer Fun Between Periods

The Cup has been awarded. Two hundred eleven young men received various degrees of validation at the Entry Draft.

Yes, this one goes to 211. There was that extra pick in Round 2. Thirty teams, seven rounds, 211 players picked. I did not make this up. Nick Ebert, the defenseman, had the longest wait among those selected on Saturday.

Then the draft was done. And summer began.

Sunday afternoon to do list: battle traffic on the Clearview Expressway; jockey for position on the Grand Central Parkway; look for an escape on the Jackie Robinson Parkway; spot a junkie about to fall off a stoop on Pennsylvania Avenue in East New York, Brooklyn; do a "French Connection" hard turn onto Linden Avenue; glide on to South Conduit Avenue; and join the parade down Cross Bay Boulevard toward the Atlantic.

Not the route I planned to take, but it was the best option on a warm summer Sunday. Rockaway Beach, Queens. You never looked so good.

Small car means easy parking under the A train tracks. Short walk past the small police precinct house, which for some reason requires more parking than you can imagine, two small apartment buildings and three large houses that are a match away from being history.

The air grows fresher. The breeze prompts a smile. The father carrying every beach chair and beach toy imaginable, all with one arm, while stringing together three children hand in hand? That guy prompts a laugh as I stand on Beach 94th Street, ready to cross Shore Front Parkway.

I come with a cooler, a folder of draft notes, a book and an assortment of thoughts about the NHL TwentyTwelvedotThirteen. Until I am told the season will not begin on time, or be played at all, I will be on the beach looking at blue skies. Or I will be turning my back on the Atlantic and walking down the Boardwalk to Beach 109th Street to watch some roller hockey. Either way, I am smiling. I am thinking of the day the leaves start to turn.

Fall cannot come soon enough.