A middle-aged man moves back to his hometown in rural Quebec because of his mother's illness. While there he is drawn to the pond where he first learned to play hockey. He remembers Robert, a retired NHLer, who taught him and his friends the rules of the game and by extension, the rules of life. Robert has since passed on, and the pond where they played and the shack where they warmed their frozen hands is derelict. The story is peppered with facts about the development of the pond hockey movement in NA. A middle-aged man moves back to his hometown in rural Quebec because of his mother's illness. While there he is drawn to the pond where he first learned to play hockey. He remembers Robert, a retired NHLer, who taught him and his friends the rules of the game and by extension, the rules of life. Robert has since passed on, and the pond where they played and the shack where they warmed their frozen hands is derelict. The story is peppered with facts about the development of the pond hockey movement in NA.