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rsadelleJeff Carter is going to play his 1,000th game today, and everyone has been having Carts and Richie feelings for a few months, so here is a thing. Back in February lakeeffectgirl was talking on Twitter about an AU where Jeff showed up at Mike's farm and never left, and I said I would also read the version where it was Jeff and Megan and the kids, and she said she would read that and also the "whatever happened to Jeff Carter?" fictional article version, and then I couldn't stop thinking about it and sent this to her with the subject line "Unexpected hockey fic." And then two months later, she sent me a link to this piece of wall art that would be the Tumblr post image header if this were a real story.
Content warnings: brain damage, depression, implied suicidal ideation.
I went looking for Jeff Carter. I found something far more important.
[Blah blah recap of Jeff's career.]
There was no formal announcement of retirement when Carter's contract with the Kings ended. The Kings issued only a statement that he had not signed a new contract with them. He didn't sign with anyone else. His wife, Megan, had a busy social media presence throughout their time in LA. When Carter's contract ended, it abruptly dwindled to the occasional retweet related to the charity work she did in LA and a few photos of their family on vacation. No one knew what Jeff Carter was doing or where his family was living. It was as if they'd dropped off the face of the Earth.
Then, three months ago, It's A Dog's Life, a dog shelter in Kenora, Ont., posted a photo to Instagram. Sharp-eyed hockey fans recognized the man in the background of the photo as Jeff Carter.
Calls to the shelter resulted in a definitive answer that it "does not release information about any personnel who may or may not work or volunteer with the shelter." Calls to Carter's former agent returned only a message that he no longer represents Jeff Carter. Attempts to reach Carter's parents and siblings went unanswered. I considered simply going to Kenora and staking out the town, but thought it would be frowned upon by my editor and would result in my expense forms being rejected.
My attempts to reach Carter did eventually bear fruit: he contacted me and invited me to visit with him for a few hours in Kenora. The day I meet with him, he texts me to let me know he's in the barn and I should just come on back.
I find Carter in a stall, currying a horse. "There's a groom," he explains, "but I like this part."
Carter has lived on the farm since he left LA the summer after his last season with the Kings. When I tell him I always imagined him retiring to the beach, he laughs. "We spend vacations on the beach."
Our conversation is interrupted by hoofbeats coming into the barn. Carter leans out into the aisle and says, "He's not supposed to be galloping."
"It was his idea," a child's voice says.
The voice that says, "Relax, Cartsy. It's a good day," sounds vaguely familiar, but I can't place it.
Carter shakes his head as he pulls back into the stall and returns to caring for the horse he introduced as Widget. He gives me a piece of carrot for Widget to eat out of my hand. For an interview he agreed to, he doesn't tell me much.
When we leave the stall, I discover why the earlier voice sounded familiar; Mike Richards is standing outside a stall, sunglasses hooked in the collar of his shirt, while Carter's oldest son, Caden, a tall, blond boy, rubs down a horse.
"Lunch soon," Carter says.
"Just gotta clean the tack," Caden says.
Carter takes me on a tour of the barn while Caden and Richards take care of their tack. I've spent very little time in horse barns, but even I can tell this one is well taken care of, as are its horses. Carter greets each one by name. Most of them lean out of their stalls to nuzzle his shoulder or get a rub behind their ears.
We're called to lunch by a loud ringing; a triangle hung on the back porch of the house being rung by Carter's oldest daughter, Emersyn.
Hands are washed in the barn and boots left by the door before I'm directed to a place at a large table in a large, open kitchen.
Megan Carter hands off the baby she'd been holding on her hip - the Carters' youngest child Avri - to Richards. He sits at the table with Avri on his lap and feeds her from a jar of pureed baby food.
Lunch is barely controlled chaos. The Carters have five children, each one as blonde as the next, and there are four dogs roaming around the floor. The food is simple, but delicious. Richards alternates feeding Avri with taking bites of his food over her head. The other children - York and Skya round out the brood - tell me about their interests.
In an afternoon full of surprises, this is the biggest one: none of Carter's children play hockey. They tell me instead about baseball, basketball, dance, horseback riding, and dogs. It's nearly unheard of for Canadian children not to play hockey, even more so for the children of a retired professional hockey player.
After lunch, the kids help clear the table, and are then sent upstairs. "They don't have to sleep," Megan explains, "but they have to be quiet for an hour. Saves the parents' sanity."
Richards returns from putting Avri down and joins us at the table for fresh glasses of lemonade. "York's obsessed with making it," Carter says.
"Constant experiments," Megan chimes in. "Different lemon varieties or sweeteners every time." She shifts her focus to Richards. "Not taking a nap?"
"It's a good day," Richards says with a shrug.
I can't contain my curiosity, and I ask about their children not playing hockey. "I have a foot that hurts like hell all winter," Carter says. "Every guy I know who played in the show has injuries like that. I love hockey, still do, still watch it, but my kids aren't playing."
It's an unorthodox opinion, particularly among retired players. When I press for more, the Carters exchange a look like they're deciding what to tell me.
Richards provides the rest of the answer: "I have brain damage. Probably CTE. I had more concussions than I can remember, and they push you to just get out and play."
A lot of things start to make sense: Carter's comment about galloping, Richards' repeated insistence that it's a good day, Carter's comment that, "It's not mine," when I complimented the farm.
Richards tells me what brain damage means for his life. He no longer drives. He doesn't go fishing alone. He stays away from screens and bright lights as much as possible. He sometimes follows hockey, but only on the radio. There are push-button intercoms between the house and the barn, with additional buttons programmed to ring both Carters' phones. He spends his time with the horses or walking the dogs along trails around the property. He suffers from depression. On good days, he lives a relatively normal life and helps with the kids. On bad ones, he doesn't get out of bed.
"I'd be dead if they weren't here," he says of the Carters. Richards is rarely in the house alone, and never overnight. When the Carters travel, Richards goes with them or has a family member stay with him at the farm.
Richards won every possible hockey championship there was, and was famously competitive. I can tell the interview is winding to a close, so I ask the big question: Was it worth it?
"On the good days," Richards says, "for sure. On the ones I want to die." he trails off and shrugs.
I thank the Carters for their hospitality. Carter walks me out to his car, and I thank him for the chance to speak to him. When I contact him later, he declines to answer any follow-up questions. I was asked not to take photos while I was at the farm; I push my luck and ask later if there is a photo I can use with the article. He sends a single photo of himself and Richards on either side of a horse. Carter grins into the sun. Richards smiles from behind his sunglasses, one hand up to further shade his eyes.
Is it worth it? I don't know, but it's a question we should ask more often.
lakeeffectgirl was talking on Twitter about an AU where Jeff showed up at Mike's farm and never left, and I said I would also read the version where it was Jeff and Megan and the kids, and she said she would read that and also the "whatever happened to Jeff Carter?" fictional article version, and then I couldn't stop thinking about it and sent this to her with the subject line "Unexpected hockey fic." And then two months later, she sent me a link to this piece of wall art that would be the Tumblr post image header if this were a real story.Content warnings: brain damage, depression, implied suicidal ideation.
I went looking for Jeff Carter. I found something far more important.
[Blah blah recap of Jeff's career.]
There was no formal announcement of retirement when Carter's contract with the Kings ended. The Kings issued only a statement that he had not signed a new contract with them. He didn't sign with anyone else. His wife, Megan, had a busy social media presence throughout their time in LA. When Carter's contract ended, it abruptly dwindled to the occasional retweet related to the charity work she did in LA and a few photos of their family on vacation. No one knew what Jeff Carter was doing or where his family was living. It was as if they'd dropped off the face of the Earth.
Then, three months ago, It's A Dog's Life, a dog shelter in Kenora, Ont., posted a photo to Instagram. Sharp-eyed hockey fans recognized the man in the background of the photo as Jeff Carter.
Calls to the shelter resulted in a definitive answer that it "does not release information about any personnel who may or may not work or volunteer with the shelter." Calls to Carter's former agent returned only a message that he no longer represents Jeff Carter. Attempts to reach Carter's parents and siblings went unanswered. I considered simply going to Kenora and staking out the town, but thought it would be frowned upon by my editor and would result in my expense forms being rejected.
My attempts to reach Carter did eventually bear fruit: he contacted me and invited me to visit with him for a few hours in Kenora. The day I meet with him, he texts me to let me know he's in the barn and I should just come on back.
I find Carter in a stall, currying a horse. "There's a groom," he explains, "but I like this part."
Carter has lived on the farm since he left LA the summer after his last season with the Kings. When I tell him I always imagined him retiring to the beach, he laughs. "We spend vacations on the beach."
Our conversation is interrupted by hoofbeats coming into the barn. Carter leans out into the aisle and says, "He's not supposed to be galloping."
"It was his idea," a child's voice says.
The voice that says, "Relax, Cartsy. It's a good day," sounds vaguely familiar, but I can't place it.
Carter shakes his head as he pulls back into the stall and returns to caring for the horse he introduced as Widget. He gives me a piece of carrot for Widget to eat out of my hand. For an interview he agreed to, he doesn't tell me much.
When we leave the stall, I discover why the earlier voice sounded familiar; Mike Richards is standing outside a stall, sunglasses hooked in the collar of his shirt, while Carter's oldest son, Caden, a tall, blond boy, rubs down a horse.
"Lunch soon," Carter says.
"Just gotta clean the tack," Caden says.
Carter takes me on a tour of the barn while Caden and Richards take care of their tack. I've spent very little time in horse barns, but even I can tell this one is well taken care of, as are its horses. Carter greets each one by name. Most of them lean out of their stalls to nuzzle his shoulder or get a rub behind their ears.
We're called to lunch by a loud ringing; a triangle hung on the back porch of the house being rung by Carter's oldest daughter, Emersyn.
Hands are washed in the barn and boots left by the door before I'm directed to a place at a large table in a large, open kitchen.
Megan Carter hands off the baby she'd been holding on her hip - the Carters' youngest child Avri - to Richards. He sits at the table with Avri on his lap and feeds her from a jar of pureed baby food.
Lunch is barely controlled chaos. The Carters have five children, each one as blonde as the next, and there are four dogs roaming around the floor. The food is simple, but delicious. Richards alternates feeding Avri with taking bites of his food over her head. The other children - York and Skya round out the brood - tell me about their interests.
In an afternoon full of surprises, this is the biggest one: none of Carter's children play hockey. They tell me instead about baseball, basketball, dance, horseback riding, and dogs. It's nearly unheard of for Canadian children not to play hockey, even more so for the children of a retired professional hockey player.
After lunch, the kids help clear the table, and are then sent upstairs. "They don't have to sleep," Megan explains, "but they have to be quiet for an hour. Saves the parents' sanity."
Richards returns from putting Avri down and joins us at the table for fresh glasses of lemonade. "York's obsessed with making it," Carter says.
"Constant experiments," Megan chimes in. "Different lemon varieties or sweeteners every time." She shifts her focus to Richards. "Not taking a nap?"
"It's a good day," Richards says with a shrug.
I can't contain my curiosity, and I ask about their children not playing hockey. "I have a foot that hurts like hell all winter," Carter says. "Every guy I know who played in the show has injuries like that. I love hockey, still do, still watch it, but my kids aren't playing."
It's an unorthodox opinion, particularly among retired players. When I press for more, the Carters exchange a look like they're deciding what to tell me.
Richards provides the rest of the answer: "I have brain damage. Probably CTE. I had more concussions than I can remember, and they push you to just get out and play."
A lot of things start to make sense: Carter's comment about galloping, Richards' repeated insistence that it's a good day, Carter's comment that, "It's not mine," when I complimented the farm.
Richards tells me what brain damage means for his life. He no longer drives. He doesn't go fishing alone. He stays away from screens and bright lights as much as possible. He sometimes follows hockey, but only on the radio. There are push-button intercoms between the house and the barn, with additional buttons programmed to ring both Carters' phones. He spends his time with the horses or walking the dogs along trails around the property. He suffers from depression. On good days, he lives a relatively normal life and helps with the kids. On bad ones, he doesn't get out of bed.
"I'd be dead if they weren't here," he says of the Carters. Richards is rarely in the house alone, and never overnight. When the Carters travel, Richards goes with them or has a family member stay with him at the farm.
Richards won every possible hockey championship there was, and was famously competitive. I can tell the interview is winding to a close, so I ask the big question: Was it worth it?
"On the good days," Richards says, "for sure. On the ones I want to die." he trails off and shrugs.
I thank the Carters for their hospitality. Carter walks me out to his car, and I thank him for the chance to speak to him. When I contact him later, he declines to answer any follow-up questions. I was asked not to take photos while I was at the farm; I push my luck and ask later if there is a photo I can use with the article. He sends a single photo of himself and Richards on either side of a horse. Carter grins into the sun. Richards smiles from behind his sunglasses, one hand up to further shade his eyes.
Is it worth it? I don't know, but it's a question we should ask more often.
(no subject)
Date: 2019-11-16 08:11 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2019-11-17 02:43 am (UTC)