This week is sports week at Beams. Some of the writers here have been exploring different aspects of sport in society and the video linked below is a perfect example of many of the things they discuss...

According to Webster's a "fan" is shorthand for a "fanatic". And the short video linked HERE (which I highly recommend watching, but unfortunately can't embed) introduces us to just such a fan.

The fellow's name is Denis Rolls and he's built the ultimate shrine for the Vancouver Canucks hockey club. There are the requisit signed pictures and posters of famous Vancouver players, the walls are lined with obscure memorabilia collected over the past three decades, and even the floor is made from thousands of hockey sticks.

In his own words, Rolls says that his whole family is "Canuck crazy" and he describes a special "loyalty" to the team. The Canucks, he says "are like a family to us."

This kind of loyalty is descriptive of the positive Mythic impulses that Br. TJ's examines in his recent article on sports. Those readers who have played team sports will likely resonate with the sentiment that your teammates become your brothers and sisters, and you care for them in many ways like you would your own family: sacrificing for them, helping them, forgiving them when things go wrong, and doing everything in your power to make sure that you all succeed together.

Rolls is also the quintessential superstitious sports fan - the man must touch his poster of the Vancouver goalie Roberto Luongo every time he makes a save! Br. Chris explores this type of sports magic in more detail, here.

A video like this one puts a human face to many of the subjects we'll be discussing this week at Beams. To me it makes TJ and Chris' ideas all the more real, and shows that the magic and mythic impulses they discuss can exist within us all. AND there's the convenient fact that Rolls just so happens to be a Canucks fan... which means he must know a lot about hockey and is probably a stand-up guy. Go Canucks Go!