Hockey Cards

The best bubble gum came in a two and a half by three and a half inch pack. It was powdery goodness in a thin stick. We'd rummage through the hockey cards inside, blowing bubbles while verbalizing as we shuffled. We'd shout a players name out and someone would chime in with one of two phrases; got it or need it. Every kid had a checklist. Once you had filled your set, you'd wrap an elastic band around it and put in a shoe box. I had a box like that once. I forgot about that box. My mother found that box and decided the church bazaar needed it more than me. I'm getting ahead of myself.

If a kid had a card you wanted, you had to challenge him or her to a game called tops. You would usually use a double you didn't need that the other player needed and he would do the same. The skill involved holding the card between your index and middle finger while resting your thumb on top and giving it a simple flip of the wrist. The rules of the game were rather simple. You just need a wall. There were two prominent walls I can recall. The brick wall of my childhood home and my grade school wall. There are variations to the game but this is the easy one; If your card lands on top your opponents card you win. You would yell Topsy! If no Topsy is declared the closest card to the wall wins. Sometimes we sweetened the pot and played a few cards. One rule had to be called out just before the game started. If you didn't yell no leaners! it didn't matter how great you could top, a leaner took it all.

By the time we were done with the cards their value was pretty used up. We didn't know how important it was to have crisp corners our corners were rounded and deemed almost worthless. Our doubles suffered a fate much worse. Decapitation. We kids loved making noise and loved anything that could make noise. We found out making noise just required a clothespin and a Bobby Hull hockey card. I had so many Bobby Hull cards; I could afford to sacrifice a few in a noise making experiment. That old Swinger bike with its banana seat and chopper handle bars had a new feature; a muffler. A clothespin attached to the rear frame with a pinned down hockey card resting on a spoke. That's all we needed to fill the air with the sounds of mutilated cardboard. Sorry Bobby putting a Maple Leaf double on my bike was unethical. The quiet one lane road wasn't as quiet that day.