In America

At Logitech arena, San Jose, last Saturday.

On that winter day when my nephew was born, his mother called to say that she was going to the hospital and asked if I could pick up his older brother from pre-school. Of course, I said. The older brother was a well-behaved, quiet boy, and it would be a pleasure to look after him.

But as for her second child, the mother knew that he would be her last and spoiled him. When he played with our children, they would constantly get into fights, as boys are wont to do. She would always take his side, whatever the facts and arguments were. He would cling to her skirts and milk her sympathy, while my boys gave him dirty looks.

A few years later they moved to Salt Lake City, a town not physically so much as culturally distant from the Bay Area. But we needn’t have worried about how our nephew would fare.

We began to receive thoughtful notes of appreciation for the gifts we sent to him. Changes were definitely afoot when, as we gathered during the holidays, he would greet us with politeness that was neither forced nor feigned. One summer in Hawaii, he asked us to be his godparents in a ceremony at St. Andrew’s Cathedral.

But the most surprising transformation occurred when he was introduced to ice hockey as a young teen. He learned to skate backwards at high speed and became a star defenseman on his high school team. An Asian kid whose parents and grandparents were born in Hawaii goes away to college and makes the hockey team. Only in America.

No 50 played a good game but his team lost. SJSU 2, Utah State 1.

The hockey player's father could be mistaken for the man who once was the most famous judge in America (Hint: it's not "Al-ito")