When do we know when enough is enough?

It's Saturday morning at 10am, and I lit a candle. 

What's going on?

As we speak, a teammate of Colin's has a meeting with the coach and the head of Youth Development, and it may be decided whether or not he's allowed to stay on the team.

We've known this boy L and his parents since Colin got accepted to the team in 2017. They are the same age, they are both a single child with supportive parents, they share the same passion for hockey, but they're very different personalities.

L is very driven, ambitious and talented. Unfortunately he is also over-eager if that's the appropriate word. He'll chase after a puck in situations where a penalty may be unavoidable. He'll address the ref and tell him what he thinks about his call, risking yet another penalty for unsportsmanlike conduct. 

In the locker room he will do silly stuff. The same other kids do as well, but it looks like he's always the one being caught or ratted out.

Last season a number of incidents led to him being suspended from playing for an entire month during the season, and again for the duration of the play-offs. 

He was officially reprimanded and told if there was one more incident, he'd be out. Again, that was last year. 

I have no idea if last warnings expire by the end of the season, and you're allowed to start with a clean slate as a new season starts, but something tells me you're probably not. 

Summer training was uneventful, and the first two exhibition games went well. He scored. Everybody had fun.

Then there was the long training weekend in the Bernese Highlands three weeks ago. Hubby and I spent the night to be able to attend the test game against the locals, as was another family. 

The refs were very strict. Someone fell, the opponent got sent to the penalty bench. Like seriously. 

By the end of the second period. the opponent had accrued 8, and our team 9 penalties. Which of course should have told every player to be extra careful and hold their horses. 

Our boy L managed to commit a foul that caused the referees to send him off the ice with a game misconduct penalty.

Immediately I though this was bad and could have further consequences for L.

When I picked Colin up the next day, I talked to L. He wasn't too worried.

It didn't take long though and we learned that he had been suspended from playing games. Oh no, not again.

The club - knowing that I film the games and produce videos for the parents' and the players' enjoyment - asked whether I recorded the particular scene? I knew I did, but I told them I had to check as I usually deleted a lot of stuff on my way home, so the upload of the relevant situations, namely when the guys score, would be speedier.

I was playing for time because I sure didn't want to be the one to contribute to throw the boy under the bus.

I talked to his Dad and shared the clip. He applied slow-motion, and when you looked at it that way the "boarding" turned out to be more of an unfortunate attempt to capture the puck than a vicious hit towards the opponent.

Still the Dad said please don't sent the video to the club. His boy was asked to describe the scene from his own point of view, which he did - probably with his Dad's help. It was written excellently, so probably not entirely a 15 yo's job. 

A few days later the Dad told me that they were informed that the head of Youth Development got involved, and that there was going to be an extensive investigation. 

At the same time the coach asked "so did you find the video, can we please have it?"

So I said to myself 

A - During the pandemic the guys played ghost games, meaning no audience allowed in the arena. Somebody on staff got an exception for me. If I was manning the penalty bench, I was allowed in, so I could film and share the video with the families. I thought they were really generous back then, and If they asked for my help this one time, who was I to say no?

B - any elementary student knows that even if you deleted something on your phone, it is restorable. I was not going to actively lie to them. 

For a second I thought about telling the Dad that I was going to hand it over, but then I didn't. I was not his son's defence attorney or something. I merely contributed evidence to the people who had to take a potentially hard decision. You know, if I had to judge over a situation, and you were given objective footage, you would feel more comfortable than if you had to take people's word. The coach said one thing, the player another. Maybe they were even saying the same thing, I didn't know. L's Dad thought the coach was inclined to support L.

So after stalling for a few days, I sent the video to the coach, saying I hoped that this would help to ensure that the "case" was viewed sympathetically.

This was ten days ago. This week, the Dad told me about today's meeting, and he learned that they got video footage, and he wondered where they got it from.

I said it was mine, and I could tell he was pissed, and while he didn't say it in so many words,  he pretty much accused me of betraying him, and more importantly his son. 

For a while I felt guilty. Should I have played dumb and told the club I had nothing? Was it gonna be my fault if the boy gets fired?

He later sent me text saying he didn't understand how I could do this to him, and he told me "imagine it was Colin who did something, and I sent incriminating evidence without telling you, respectively ignoring your asking me not to."

Wow. More than anything else, this told me I did nothing wrong.

First of all, Colin is far, far away from ever pulling stunts like this on and off the ice. He knows better.

Second of all, I would never ask anybody to obstruct an investigation. If my boy had several and a last warning, and if something happened that caused the glass to overflow, I would tell him to own up and not try and influence other people to help cover it up. 

Also, can we talk about players' safety for a minute? The opponent got pushed into the board. This may have caused a serious injury. People are known to have suffered concussions from this kind of incident. 

When do we know when enough is enough?

Working in HR I've been in several situations where employees had written warnings, and sh** happened again. Technically you had to fire them, but there's always reasons not to do it. So you decide to give them another chance. In doing so you usually just delay the inevitable. At some point you will have to follow through. 

There was this one time at the airline when an engineer came forward and confessed to his supervisor that he had a beer last night.

What was the big deal? It was his day off, he could do as he pleased.

Or couldn't he?

The guy was a recovering alcoholic who went through company-sponsored counselling and was on his last warning. "One drink, and you're out." This all happened before I (and his immediate supervisor for that matter) joined, and we didn't even know about this.

People who work in and on aircrafts have strict rules when it comes to substances that alter their ability to do safety-relevant work. Obviously, right? 

So his manager and I felt super conflicted. We weren't around when things were bad. I believe to remember that it was in his file that at some point this engineer had to be sent home during a shift. Other times he would oversleep or not show up. We only had perceived the guy as just one of the guys, going about his day and doing a solid job.

We had a meeting, and we didn't know what to do. I pointed out that I appreciated his honesty. He could have chosen not to tell anybody and to risk a random pee check to which everybody is subject to on a regular basis, but he preferred to be upfront about having made a mistake. 

Long story short, we sent him to do more counselling and extended the last warning to "but next time you're really gone". He was very grateful. By the time I left the organization he was still there, working and doing well. So back then, being gracious has payed off.

Back to the youth hockey player, I think it's a similar thing, and there are two reasons this boy has not been released a long time ago:

• People like him
• He's a brilliant hockey player

In the meantime the meeting must be over. I haven't heard about the outcome. I may later today at the game.

Yes, it's the second championship match of the season, and after that we'll have dinner with friends and then attend the National League's game in the same arena. Fun night for us. Let's hope L got off with a last warning as well.