The Goal of My Life (3 page)

It’s funny how much my relationship with my father affected so much of my life and the person that I am today, albeit in many an inadvertent way. In taking another long look back at my life, I can see where much of my confidence comes from. It came from my dad, which is amazing to me in some ways. Ironically, what I thought was one of the worst things my dad ever did to me might have resulted in me having the kind of confidence I’ve had all my life.

My dad was always demanding of me, and was seldom
complimentary toward me, no matter what I did. He was a product of his times, an old-school, chauvinistic man who didn’t understand psychology or how to handle children. He coached me a lot growing up, and I’d score three, four, or even five goals in a game and he would still get on me. He’d always be nitpicking about something I hadn’t done instead of praising me for what I did. It was just the way he was, but I knew that he was very proud of me – because he’d be coaching me and he wouldn’t let me off the ice! I’d be on a forward line and he’d make me stay out there and play defence to catch my breath instead of taking me off. He wanted me out on the ice all the time.

I remember one time when he was coaching me in peewee and we were losing the game and he was angry. He walked into the dressing room during an intermission and said, “Listen up, you guys. Just give the puck to Paul and get the hell out of his way.” I thought it was just a terrible thing to say to the other players, who were all my friends. I couldn’t even look up and face them. How humiliating that was for me then, how embarrassing, having my father basically tell the rest of my team that they weren’t good enough but I was. After that game, however, I also remember thinking that my dad thought I was good – really good – and I felt so pleased that he was that proud of me.

I never forgot that moment and still think about it to this day. At the time, I was so embarrassed by what he said. I didn’t like him treating my friends that way and putting me on the spot. But as I grew older and more mature, it dawned on me that my father had affirmed me, and he was very proud of me. I have since read that every young man needs to be affirmed by his father to really become a man. I agree.

I was a confident kid and dreamed that I could turn out to be a hockey player. I was so confident that I started practising my autograph when I was in grade five for when I made it to the
NHL
! Where did that come from? Today, I believe that much of it came from that incident when my father affirmed me in front of my teammates.

My dad and I had our issues, but he was the person who convinced me that I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I didn’t give hockey a real shot when I wanted to quit the game in junior, and his perhaps misguided affirmation of me as a young man gave me the self-confidence I needed to get to that level to start with.

So given all this, what are the odds of a kid from Lucknow, Ontario, making it all the way to the
NHL
? Pretty high, I imagine.

Sports were a big part of my life at an early age, and I was a good athlete just like my parents were. Both of them were very quick and strong runners, so the genes were good for me. I played football and baseball (I was on a championship baseball team when I was sixteen years old), but hockey really turned out to be my thing, and my greatest asset as I developed was my speed.

I was also a pretty good student most of the time, especially when I was motivated to learn something. In grade six I got really serious about academics, as my competitive side came out in the classroom. There were two girls in our class who were excellent students and always had the highest marks. After seeing their report cards one term, I just decided then and there that I was going to be the one with the highest marks by the time the next report
card came around. I put my mind to it, and sure enough, I was able to do it.

I credit playing team sports for teaching me great life lessons. When you are successful in a team sport, it instills confidence and a sense of belonging, of being part of something bigger than yourself. You always feel better when you know you have done your very best for yourself and your team. You learn that there are no shortcuts to success, and that hard work pays off in the long run. You realize that you need others to do well for you to succeed, and that the more you try to be a good team player, the better things will go for you individually. When you win as a team and start excelling, you get great satisfaction from that winning, and that becomes addictive.

But despite all that, my fear of being poor nearly did indeed stop me from pursuing a pro hockey career, and it took my dad to convince me not to give up on the game too early.

There really is no other way to say it than this: we were poor. We didn’t have much money for anything, and our family had a lot of debt. It was a real problem in our household. My parents didn’t understand what a lot of people don’t, especially today. You have to spend less money than you make – that’s the simple truth that so many people just can’t seem to come to grips with. My dad got sucked into that debt trap, and it made it very hard on all of us while I was growing up. The arguments and fights my parents had were almost always because of a lack of money.

You learn how to look after yourself when you are in a situation like that when you are young. I vowed that I would never live like that when I got older; I wouldn’t let a lack of money become an issue for me the way it was for my parents.
By the time I was in grade nine I was basically self-sufficient in terms of making money on my own. I always found jobs to make money, from piling wood, to picking apples, to working on a farm. I worked at Cyril Brown’s grocery store from 4:00 p.m. until 6:30 p.m. every weekday and every Saturday from 9:00 a.m. until 11:00 p.m. Working all those hours allowed me to have enough money to clothe myself and to get some of the things I wanted. My parents sure couldn’t afford to give me most of those things.

As a result, I have always understood the value of money and living within your means. I paid cash for almost everything, and although I had a mortgage on the first house I ever bought, since then I’ve paid for everything in cash. I’ve always lived with the dread of going into debt.

That job in the grocery store not only helped me with my financial situation, it also helped me to find the woman who would turn out to be my wife for five decades, the great love of my life. I knew very quickly that Eleanor Alton was the one for me, right from the time I first saw her in the summer of 1959. The absolute best decision I ever made was the one I made regarding the woman I chose as my life’s partner. I don’t know anybody who lives life better as wife, mother, and grandmother than Eleanor does. She is definitely my rock and the love of my life.

The thing that made it so easy for me to decide that she was the one was that I had already decided on what I was looking for in a wife. I believe that you won’t find what you’re looking for until you know what it is you’re looking for. I wasn’t after a career-minded woman; I was looking for someone who wanted to be a wife and a mother more than having a career. Sure, looks are always important to a young
guy, but more than that I wanted someone with common sense, someone who was willing to work, and someone who definitely was not a prima donna or in any way a drama queen.

I was a product of my generation, I guess, and I felt I was to be the provider and she’d be the stay-at-home mom to our children. And she had to be a really great cook! My mom, whom I loved dearly, was an okay cook, but I learned from my aunts the difference between being an okay cook and a great cook. And for sure I wanted a great cook for a wife!

Eleanor filled the bill in every way and more. What a sensational wife and partner to me she has been every step of the way.

Within a month after our first date, I told her she was the girl I was set on to marry.

“I’m going to marry you, Eleanor; you can forget about everyone else,” I told her straight out.

“Well, aren’t you arrogant,” was her straight-to-the-point reply.

Needless to say, it took her a little longer to embrace the idea that we were made for each other! But I’d say within the first year she came to the same conclusion that I had already come to – and thank God she did.

I first laid eyes on her at Cyril Brown’s fruit market in Lucknow. In she came, with a friend, and I immediately went to work to try to impress this slim fifteen-year-old girl with beautiful brown hair while the two were looking at some lettuce.

“Can I help you?” I asked.

“We’re looking for some lettuce,” Eleanor replied.

“Don’t touch that stuff,” I said, immediately showing my expertise. “Wait right here. I will take care of you.”

I walked quickly to the back of the store and got some really fresh lettuce. I had to go through several boxes until I found two huge heads that were just perfect. I cleaned them off, slicked back my Brylcreemed hair in Elvis Presley style, and returned acting as cool as – well, a head of lettuce, I guess!

I wasn’t nearly as suave as I thought I was, but I did manage to converse with Eleanor long enough to get that all-important phone number.

From the moment we started dating, I loved everything about her. I liked to dance, and she was such a terrific dancer and could follow me anywhere on the dance floor. She looked so great out there and I was so proud to be seen with her.

She was a worker too, let’s make no mistake about that. I remember for our first date, I came to get her when she was working on her parents’ farm. While I waited for her to finish milking the cows, I asked her how I could help. She told me it’d be a big help if I could assist her in carrying the milk to the separators in the same containers she was already carrying.

I was happy to help – until I picked one up and realized how heavy they were! She, however, managed to lift them with relative ease, and she looked just great doing it. Holy mackerel, I thought to myself, is this girl ever strong! It was obvious to me that she knew how to work and that she had to be responsible to do the milking on her own while her father and brothers were working in the fields.

She cleaned up and we drove off to Goderich for our first date. It was a Friday night and I was feeling like a million bucks, sitting next to the prettiest girl in the world.

It was then time to show her just how suave this Paul Henderson guy was and buy her something to eat. We went to Pete’s Hot Dog Stand.

I got out of the car and ordered two foot-long hot dogs, two large orders of fries, and two giant Cokes. I was all set to hand Eleanor her hot dog, fries, and Coke – but the tray slipped from my hand and fell into her lap, and the Coke, relish, and ketchup destroyed her white linen skirt. Disaster! I just wanted to crawl under that car and let it run over me, I was so embarrassed! It was terrible. But fortunately for me, Eleanor had a great sense of humour – enough of one to agree to see this joker again, despite that mess!

We started dating when I was sixteen and she was fifteen, and we got married very young, when I was nineteen and she was eighteen, on November 10, 1962. We’ll celebrate fifty years together in 2012, God willing, so I really made the right call on this one.

I made a vow to her right from the start of our relationship.

“We’ll never be poor,” I said to her. “I don’t care what it takes: I’m going to be successful. I don’t want to live like my parents.”

I took that vow very seriously, and even though I was sure I had the talent to be an
NHL
player, I also knew that getting a good education was critical for me – what would happen if I couldn’t make the grade and make a living playing in the
NHL?

My junior hockey career was winding down. We’d won the Memorial Cup in 1962, and I had just one more year of junior eligibility left. Eleanor and I talked about our future, and we both felt that giving up hockey and getting an education was the way to go for me. I had pretty much decided
that I would give up on the game and get a university education – an education that would provide a good future and foundation for Eleanor and myself – and I wouldn’t be in the same position my parents had been in for so many years.

Eleanor was then and still is today my biggest backer and supporter. She was with me in whatever decision I made, but there was still the matter of telling this to my dad, who had spent so much time coaching me over the years.

I have to admit I dreaded having to tell my father the news. Up until that time, I had had only peripheral conversations with him, as we really didn’t know how to communicate with each other. He was a product of his times – he ran the household and would seldom discuss things even with my mother – so I was really hesitant to tell him my plans.

I knew I had to, however, so I sat my dad down and told him what I had in mind, and I thought he’d go crazy.

He shocked me. He didn’t get angry at all. In fact, he sat and listened to what I had to say, and maybe for the first time in our lives, we had a really meaningful conversation about my future and what I should be doing with my life.

Not only didn’t he yell and get mad and call me a fool, but he also didn’t tell me to change my mind – at least not immediately. His advice hit right to the point.

“Think about this,” he told me. “The one thing that I think will drive you crazy is that on a Saturday night when you’re watching
Hockey Night in Canada
, you’ll be asking yourself, ‘Could I have made it?’ Think about that. I think it will drive you crazy not knowing if you could have made it. I really believe you can make it and I think that you really believe that also.”

It was great advice, and important advice for me to consider at that time. I thought it over and talked to Eleanor about it and we decided that I would play my last year of junior, really give it my best shot, and if I didn’t make it to the
NHL
in the next two years, then I could quit the game and move on and get my education. Then and only then could I watch
Hockey Night in Canada
and not wonder, “What if?”

I had to really find out if I was good enough. And the only way to do that was to do everything I could to make a career out of hockey. Well, I did just that, and I led the league in scoring, I was a first team all-star right-winger, and I was considered an
NHL
prospect. I made it to Detroit the next year, and it went on from there.