from Les Carpenter of The Guardian,

The code. The code. The code. That’s all that mattered in those days. Maybe it’s all that matters still. Hockey has always been a referendum on intrepidness. Who’s a tough guy? Who is not?

Former NHL referee Paul Stewart can still hear the words thundering down from a boss when back trouble forced him to lug his gear through airports and train stations in a rolling travel bag rather than one thrown over his shoulder.

“You look like a fag.”

This wasn’t that long ago. Stewart only retired in 2003, and the rolling bag came a few years before that – maybe a little before he found he had stage three colon cancer in the middle of a 1,000-game NHL officiating career. Always the code. Always be tough. The word he despised was “pussy”. It was tossed around rinks like a mark of shame. Use a rolling bag? You’re a pussy. Wear a helmet? What a pussy. Dare to say your head doesn’t feel right after it cracked against the ice? Don’t be a pussy.

So Stewart said nothing about the ringing in his skull on those nights after especially hard hits. To admit the confusion, the nausea, the gaps in recollection would be labeled a pussy, and there was no room for pussies in professional hockey. It’s only now, more than a decade after his last game, with nothing to lose, no reputation to risk that Stewart finally tells the truth. All those concussions the football players get that are also the domain of the hockey enforcers? Well, referees get those too. It’s just something nobody talks about.

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