Brian Burke Profile In Courage

As a gay man, who played hockey well enough to be scouted and inviting to sign a letter of intent with a NHL team, the story of Brendan Burke resonated for me in way deeper than most. A goalie, like me, he quit playing hockey at age 16, tired of the locker room anti-gay taunts, terrified that he would be outed and would lose much more than his standing on a team. I quit when I was 17, and assigned to the distraction of my parent’s impending divorce, but the truth was it that more and more I could not navigate the two lives that seemed necessary to survive. I was angry, mostly because I loved playing hockey, and continued to get better and better. When Brendan came out publically in November, 2009, it was inspiring. When he died a little more than two months later, on February 5th, 2010, two days before my birthday, it was cruelly devastating, a loss that seemed to require learning a different language in order to accurately express how sad and how tragic his death in a car accident in a serious snowstorm in the middle of Indiana was. Brendan, the son of Toronto Maple Leafs General Manager Brian Burke, lives on, thankfully, his work continuing through his father and older brother Patrick, their story told by Mary Rogan in GQ in a way that is moving and powerful, and as a reminder of all that is precious and of all that is possible.