[Music]
hello Calgary it’s very cool for me to
be here today to speak to all of you a
lot of people look at me and think of me
as a pioneer in hockey in women’s hockey
but I’m not a pioneer these women were
pioneers as far back as late 1800s
women’s hockey was documented being
played and right here in Canada
Lord Stanley Preston the Governor
General of Canada and hence the Stanley
Cup
his daughter Isabel was one of the first
filmed and photographed female hockey
players in this country in the early
1900s when the men went off to war for
World War one in World War two some
smart entrepreneurial businessmen
decided that it would be great to keep
the hockey spirit alive in this country
and have women play and so the eastern
ladies hockey league was formed and they
called them Ladyhawke iasts I can’t
imagine being called the lady Hawk iasts
but they were and so these women played
every Monday night across the eastern
seaboard and filled the ranks of up to
3,200 people and entertain people during
the wartime you could argue back then
that women’s hockey was more popular
then than it might be today
now when the war ended and the men came
back from war women’s hockey sort of
died until the 1960s until another group
of pioneers came along and inspired
someone like myself but that’s not my
story
this is my story just a little
five-year-old kid growing up in Sean
‘van Saskatchewan who watched my mom and
dad hang out at the rink because that’s
all there really was to do in the little
town that I came from they were
schoolteachers and my dad played
old-timers hockey and I watched him play
and one day I said well I’d like to play
and luckily for me I had two parents who
believed that a girl could do anything
that a boy could do and so
and so they put me in the game but the
story of my childhood was a little
different than the average boy growing
up in Sean of in Saskatchewan when I was
five and six years old the narrative for
girls playing hockey in my town and in
the world really was girls don’t play
hockey and luckily for me there were two
reasons why I played my mom and dad who
sheltered me from a lot of the abuse and
the criticism that was dealt my way and
the fact that in a very small town you
needed warm bodies to fill a team and so
they were happy to have me when I got a
little older it was a little tougher I
was changing in places like boiler rooms
the backseat of the car the bathroom
stall while mums from the other team
would chatter about the girl on the
other team and it wasn’t easy when I
became a teenager the narrative changed
again now here you see me in this was
1998 1999 I was attending the
Philadelphia Flyers development camp
because in the 98 Olympics when I was 18
years old Bobby Clarke who is the
general manager of the Philadelphia
Flyers watched me play in those Olympic
games he liked the way that I played and
he invited me to camp but just three
years prior to stepping into an NHL
level camp I was playing midget triple-a
hockey right here in Calgary and I tried
out for the team on the boys side I
believe I’m the only girl that’s ever
made a mid to triple-a boys hockey
league in the city since and I’m and I
played and 15 games into the season we
went on a road trip to Medicine Hat
Alberta and I had a really good
tournament maybe one of my better
performances at the time and I was very
excited about solidifying myself on the
team being part of the team finally and
when the bus pulled up to father David
Bower Arena and Calgary the coach called
me into his office and I thought he was
calling me into his office to say you
know a great job I’m gonna gonna put you
on the power play now or whatever it
might be but instead you look
me in the eye and he said you know
you’re a really good hockey player but I
can’t handle having a girl on the team
and so I’m gonna let you go so there I
was standing and father David Bauer
arena while my mom was waiting in the
parking lot for me to come out and tell
her how great the tournament was and
when I walked outside and I opened the
car door and my mom said so how’d it go
I heard you played really well I said I
just got cut and the look in my mom’s
eyes at the time I’ll never forget it
because I remember as a kid growing up
all the times that my parents had
protected me and sheltered me from the
things that I had to hear and had to go
through
instead of getting irate ly mad or
flying off the handle she just looked at
me in the eye and said are you sure you
want to keep going because this is
getting really hard to watch
and so felt pretty sorry for myself for
a few minutes and definitely it was
devastating but something inside me
which is always driven me in my career
said bucket Bock this
[Applause]
and so I realized that talent alone
wasn’t gonna get me anywhere in this
game that really talent alone isn’t
gonna get anybody anywhere no one owes
me anything no one owes any of us
anything I was gonna have to figure out
a way to keep alive in the game and so I
realized at the time that I was
overcoming this giant bucket list and on
my bucket list
which is not your traditional bucket
list I did not want to jump out of an
airplane or climb Everest no I was
actually bucking it and the things that
I had to buck were things like gender
girls don’t play hockey well guess what
a hundred thousand girls in this country
play hockey right now
tradition the tradition of hockey is
very steeped in the male-dominated world
very difficult to overcome the fear of
failure because for me as a young girl
failing was not an option and it wasn’t
an option because it was the only way I
was going to be long
I put an intense amount of pressure on
myself and I was intensely afraid of
failing and the status quo the status
quo was very hard at the time no one
stood up in that midget triple-a
organization and said this is not right
even though I made that team and lastly
don’t rock the boat mentality because
sometimes it’s easier to just sit back
and do nothing than to put yourself out
there now I want you guys to all close
your eyes for a second and I want you to
imagine you’re in your high school
parking lot and two kids two boys or two
girls it doesn’t really matter they’re
about to fight now do you see a crowd of
people around these kids
chances are you you probably do now what
if that crowd wasn’t there would those
kids still fight what if one kid in the
crowd decided to step up and say this
isn’t right and break up the fight what
might happen to that kid because the
reality in today’s world is that the
herd mentality is really dangerous and
the world needs less sheep and by less
sheep I mean if you imagine sheep what
happens when sheep go in a herd and they
follow the leader they do anything that
the leader does and sometimes that means
even going right over a cliff and don’t
we see that in today’s world over and
over again when I became an adult in the
game of hockey the narrative change from
as a teenager you’re a girl you’re
pretty good we don’t want you to now
what are we gonna do with you because
not only was there me playing hockey
there was a whole slew of other women in
Canada and around the world with their
bucket lists and now we had a national
team of women playing Hawk
and I have to say in what other country
in the world would you see an image like
this and know that that was a bunch of
women on the ice and that they were able
to play the game I think the world needs
more Canada
but the narrative change and the
establishment didn’t like it
the Hockey Canada is the hockey USA is
Swedish hockey you name it they were
uncomfortable with a bunch of women that
had demands and wanted to play the game
and actually might actually want to get
paid for playing it what were we gonna
do now but the thing with a bucket list
is that you don’t just buck it to be
cool or be a rebel about it without a
cause you bucket because there’s
something wrong people are being
persecuted they’re not getting the
opportunities that they should the
status quo isn’t okay I’ll give you
three examples of where the status quo
wasn’t okay Martin Luther King jr. the
1960s he changed the way that we look at
civil rights today by civil disobedience
and peaceful protesting and inspired
millions around the world Warren Buffett
who the richest man in the world created
the Giving Pledge and chose to give away
99% of his wealth inspiring over 30
other billionaires like Bill Gates and
Elon Musk to do the same he decided that
the disparity between rich and poor is
too great in this world and he did
something about it and the last example
in the most recent example is the USA
women’s national hockey team who just a
few months ago decided to bucket and
buck the status quo by fighting for a
pay raise they were getting paid $6,000
per year per player from USA Hockey and
with a massive media movement and 18 US
senators writing letters and a host of
other people around the world supporting
them they went from a pay raise of
$6,000 a year to $70,000 per player with
bonuses pretty impressive
and super inspiring and it’s gonna make
it much easier for any other female
athlete in any other sport to get paid
one day and so for me although my life
in hockey is is over as a player the
next path that I hope to blaze one day
will hopefully be a career in medicine
and maybe someday as a doctor now the
cool thing about me standing up here
telling all of you guys that I want to
be a doctor is that probably none of you
thought to yourself Wow
she wants to be a doctor maybe you
thought to yourself oh my god she’s so
old why she going to medical school now
but I hardly think many of you thought
she wants to be a doctor and the reason
why is about a hundred years ago there
was a woman named Emily Howard Stowe and
she decided that she wanted to be a
doctor and she became Canada’s first
female physician she bucked it she
bucked the status quo and so my hope for
all of you today when you leave is that
if you don’t already have your own
bucket list that you make one and that
the next time you’re in an environment
where someone says you can’t do
something because of your gender your
race your religion your sexual
orientation or or or that you stand up
and you say bucket bucket thank you very
much Calgary have a great day
you
hello Calgary it’s very cool for me to
be here today to speak to all of you a
lot of people look at me and think of me
as a pioneer in hockey in women’s hockey
but I’m not a pioneer these women were
pioneers as far back as late 1800s
women’s hockey was documented being
played and right here in Canada
Lord Stanley Preston the Governor
General of Canada and hence the Stanley
Cup
his daughter Isabel was one of the first
filmed and photographed female hockey
players in this country in the early
1900s when the men went off to war for
World War one in World War two some
smart entrepreneurial businessmen
decided that it would be great to keep
the hockey spirit alive in this country
and have women play and so the eastern
ladies hockey league was formed and they
called them Ladyhawke iasts I can’t
imagine being called the lady Hawk iasts
but they were and so these women played
every Monday night across the eastern
seaboard and filled the ranks of up to
3,200 people and entertain people during
the wartime you could argue back then
that women’s hockey was more popular
then than it might be today
now when the war ended and the men came
back from war women’s hockey sort of
died until the 1960s until another group
of pioneers came along and inspired
someone like myself but that’s not my
story
this is my story just a little
five-year-old kid growing up in Sean
‘van Saskatchewan who watched my mom and
dad hang out at the rink because that’s
all there really was to do in the little
town that I came from they were
schoolteachers and my dad played
old-timers hockey and I watched him play
and one day I said well I’d like to play
and luckily for me I had two parents who
believed that a girl could do anything
that a boy could do and so
and so they put me in the game but the
story of my childhood was a little
different than the average boy growing
up in Sean of in Saskatchewan when I was
five and six years old the narrative for
girls playing hockey in my town and in
the world really was girls don’t play
hockey and luckily for me there were two
reasons why I played my mom and dad who
sheltered me from a lot of the abuse and
the criticism that was dealt my way and
the fact that in a very small town you
needed warm bodies to fill a team and so
they were happy to have me when I got a
little older it was a little tougher I
was changing in places like boiler rooms
the backseat of the car the bathroom
stall while mums from the other team
would chatter about the girl on the
other team and it wasn’t easy when I
became a teenager the narrative changed
again now here you see me in this was
1998 1999 I was attending the
Philadelphia Flyers development camp
because in the 98 Olympics when I was 18
years old Bobby Clarke who is the
general manager of the Philadelphia
Flyers watched me play in those Olympic
games he liked the way that I played and
he invited me to camp but just three
years prior to stepping into an NHL
level camp I was playing midget triple-a
hockey right here in Calgary and I tried
out for the team on the boys side I
believe I’m the only girl that’s ever
made a mid to triple-a boys hockey
league in the city since and I’m and I
played and 15 games into the season we
went on a road trip to Medicine Hat
Alberta and I had a really good
tournament maybe one of my better
performances at the time and I was very
excited about solidifying myself on the
team being part of the team finally and
when the bus pulled up to father David
Bower Arena and Calgary the coach called
me into his office and I thought he was
calling me into his office to say you
know a great job I’m gonna gonna put you
on the power play now or whatever it
might be but instead you look
me in the eye and he said you know
you’re a really good hockey player but I
can’t handle having a girl on the team
and so I’m gonna let you go so there I
was standing and father David Bauer
arena while my mom was waiting in the
parking lot for me to come out and tell
her how great the tournament was and
when I walked outside and I opened the
car door and my mom said so how’d it go
I heard you played really well I said I
just got cut and the look in my mom’s
eyes at the time I’ll never forget it
because I remember as a kid growing up
all the times that my parents had
protected me and sheltered me from the
things that I had to hear and had to go
through
instead of getting irate ly mad or
flying off the handle she just looked at
me in the eye and said are you sure you
want to keep going because this is
getting really hard to watch
and so felt pretty sorry for myself for
a few minutes and definitely it was
devastating but something inside me
which is always driven me in my career
said bucket Bock this
[Applause]
and so I realized that talent alone
wasn’t gonna get me anywhere in this
game that really talent alone isn’t
gonna get anybody anywhere no one owes
me anything no one owes any of us
anything I was gonna have to figure out
a way to keep alive in the game and so I
realized at the time that I was
overcoming this giant bucket list and on
my bucket list
which is not your traditional bucket
list I did not want to jump out of an
airplane or climb Everest no I was
actually bucking it and the things that
I had to buck were things like gender
girls don’t play hockey well guess what
a hundred thousand girls in this country
play hockey right now
tradition the tradition of hockey is
very steeped in the male-dominated world
very difficult to overcome the fear of
failure because for me as a young girl
failing was not an option and it wasn’t
an option because it was the only way I
was going to be long
I put an intense amount of pressure on
myself and I was intensely afraid of
failing and the status quo the status
quo was very hard at the time no one
stood up in that midget triple-a
organization and said this is not right
even though I made that team and lastly
don’t rock the boat mentality because
sometimes it’s easier to just sit back
and do nothing than to put yourself out
there now I want you guys to all close
your eyes for a second and I want you to
imagine you’re in your high school
parking lot and two kids two boys or two
girls it doesn’t really matter they’re
about to fight now do you see a crowd of
people around these kids
chances are you you probably do now what
if that crowd wasn’t there would those
kids still fight what if one kid in the
crowd decided to step up and say this
isn’t right and break up the fight what
might happen to that kid because the
reality in today’s world is that the
herd mentality is really dangerous and
the world needs less sheep and by less
sheep I mean if you imagine sheep what
happens when sheep go in a herd and they
follow the leader they do anything that
the leader does and sometimes that means
even going right over a cliff and don’t
we see that in today’s world over and
over again when I became an adult in the
game of hockey the narrative change from
as a teenager you’re a girl you’re
pretty good we don’t want you to now
what are we gonna do with you because
not only was there me playing hockey
there was a whole slew of other women in
Canada and around the world with their
bucket lists and now we had a national
team of women playing Hawk
and I have to say in what other country
in the world would you see an image like
this and know that that was a bunch of
women on the ice and that they were able
to play the game I think the world needs
more Canada
but the narrative change and the
establishment didn’t like it
the Hockey Canada is the hockey USA is
Swedish hockey you name it they were
uncomfortable with a bunch of women that
had demands and wanted to play the game
and actually might actually want to get
paid for playing it what were we gonna
do now but the thing with a bucket list
is that you don’t just buck it to be
cool or be a rebel about it without a
cause you bucket because there’s
something wrong people are being
persecuted they’re not getting the
opportunities that they should the
status quo isn’t okay I’ll give you
three examples of where the status quo
wasn’t okay Martin Luther King jr. the
1960s he changed the way that we look at
civil rights today by civil disobedience
and peaceful protesting and inspired
millions around the world Warren Buffett
who the richest man in the world created
the Giving Pledge and chose to give away
99% of his wealth inspiring over 30
other billionaires like Bill Gates and
Elon Musk to do the same he decided that
the disparity between rich and poor is
too great in this world and he did
something about it and the last example
in the most recent example is the USA
women’s national hockey team who just a
few months ago decided to bucket and
buck the status quo by fighting for a
pay raise they were getting paid $6,000
per year per player from USA Hockey and
with a massive media movement and 18 US
senators writing letters and a host of
other people around the world supporting
them they went from a pay raise of
$6,000 a year to $70,000 per player with
bonuses pretty impressive
and super inspiring and it’s gonna make
it much easier for any other female
athlete in any other sport to get paid
one day and so for me although my life
in hockey is is over as a player the
next path that I hope to blaze one day
will hopefully be a career in medicine
and maybe someday as a doctor now the
cool thing about me standing up here
telling all of you guys that I want to
be a doctor is that probably none of you
thought to yourself Wow
she wants to be a doctor maybe you
thought to yourself oh my god she’s so
old why she going to medical school now
but I hardly think many of you thought
she wants to be a doctor and the reason
why is about a hundred years ago there
was a woman named Emily Howard Stowe and
she decided that she wanted to be a
doctor and she became Canada’s first
female physician she bucked it she
bucked the status quo and so my hope for
all of you today when you leave is that
if you don’t already have your own
bucket list that you make one and that
the next time you’re in an environment
where someone says you can’t do
something because of your gender your
race your religion your sexual
orientation or or or that you stand up
and you say bucket bucket thank you very
much Calgary have a great day
you
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