ESPN.com Page 2 column
December 12, 2006
by LZ Granderson
One of the great things about growing up in Detroit was our proximity to Canada. In 10 minutes or so you could be in Ontario, where the exchange rate was still strongly in our favor, the legal drinking age was 18 and it was safe to eat the fish you caught.
We could also get Channel 9, the Canadian television station which, before the days of cable, would broadcast the Red Wings. This is where I first saw the grace and beauty of hockey and the magic of Steve Yzerman.
For a while my family of seven had only one television, so debating what we would watch was a form of entertainment itself. Occasionally I would bring up the Red Wings. Those were also the occasions my mother allowed the other kids to curse at me.
“Hell no, that’s for white people,” and then my older sister would turn on “The Dukes of Hazzard” and cheer for a car with the confederate flag painted on the roof. She never saw the irony. I never pointed it out.
