Stanley Cup Riots In Grafton

Stanley Cup Riots In Grafton

May, 2012

by John Leahy

I watched the final Stanley Cup game for the New York Rangers at my home in the small woodsy town of Grafton, New York, in the Taconic Hills near the Massachusetts and Vermont border. The Rangers lost and were knocked out of the Cup and I began looking around at my options for post Stanley Cup loss rioting.

Decisively, I got into my old Chevy pickup truck and gunned it down my dirt road. A squirrel scurried out of my way. Two minutes later I arrived at my neighbor’s house. The lights were out. I threw a beer can out the window onto their lawn. I revved my engine and took off.

In the center of town I pulled up at the stop sign. One of my kid’s crayons was on the front seat and I grabbed it and quickly scrawled “Potvin Sucks!” on the stop sign. I sped off looking for other symbols of governmental authority and oppression to direct my rage at. Outside the post office I spied the mail box. I got out and heaved a heavy rock at it. The rock bounced with a booming gong and left a barely perceptible dent in the front of the mail box. A dog jumped up on a porch across the square and stared out at the public disturbance and then laid down again and went back to sleep.

I looked around for signs of the police to do battle. “Where are the damn pigs?” I muttered. I noticed the van for the Senior Citizens Center and realized I had found my target. I gathered some grimy old newspaper from the floor of my truck and piled them under the van. I took the ancient book of matches from my glove box and struck the first match. The match tip crumbled. I tried all 7 of the remaining matches with the same result. I threw the empty match book at the van’s windshield. The glass did not break. I drove over to the Country Store to get more matches, but it was closed. I saw a dried out pine cone on the ground and I slung it at the store’s window. The dried out pine cone curved to the left and bounced lightly off the wall.

I got back in my truck and took off. A car came towards me and I flashed my high beams at it. The car honked angrily as it passed. My pulse raced. Now I am truly in the rioter zone. I passed a house with a tricycle on the lawn. I screeched to a halt and jumped out and grabbed the tricycle and threw it into a decorative shrubbery. Two houses down I stopped by a neat stack of firewood and began slinging pieces of firewood from the top of the wall into the vegetable garden. I slung at least four pieces of wood before leaping back into my truck to continue my rampage.

The low fuel warning light came on the dashboard panel. I thought of going back to the Country Store for gas, but then remembered that it was after 7 PM and the store was closed. I had enough gas to get this guzzler back home and to a gas station tomorrow. I parked in my driveway. I saw some BBQ fuel and matches in the garage. I looked at my house…………………………..