Maple Leafs fans are linked by a long, prideful streak of masochism

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How are you feeling? Strong? Able to absorb life’s blows and keep moving forward?

Then it’s possible – not advisable, but possible – that you should continue to believe the Toronto Maple Leafs are going to come back on the Boston Bruins. They’re down 3-2 and they’re coming home on Thursday, so you know that’s trouble.

Talk to your doctor. However many medical experts you have access to – ask them all. They are in the best position to advise you.

This test may help. Have you at any point in the past:

• Told someone you could fix the Leafs’ power play.
• Told someone you could coach the team.
• Told someone that you’d make a hell of a GM.
• Told someone that God knows you’re not first-line material any more, but fourth line? Like, how could you be any worse?
• Promised never to watch the Leafs again.
• Sent an official letter of complaint. To anyone. For any reason.
• Told a friend that if you’d been raised in a different world, at a different time, you think you might be into the Canadiens.

If you have answered ‘yes’ to any of those questions, go slowly. This might be too much for you.

If you feel you must believe in the Leafs, make sure you are with someone who cares. About you, not the Leafs. We don’t need both of you in crisis at once.

Ask family what they think you should do. They know you better than anyone. Are you the sort of person who thinks constant, crushing disappointment doesn’t affect you, but they often find you sitting alone in the garage with sports radio turned on, weeping for no reason.

Are you a superstitious person? Sometimes our faith can sustain us. Even though, in this case, it has brought you nothing but red-hot psychic pain for your entire life. God may hate a quitter, but I’m also pretty sure he’s a Bruins sports fan.

It’s possible you think you’ve cracked the superstition code. That if you watch Game 6 in a certain way with a certain set of rituals, things will turn out. But that’s not how the occult works. It requires a sacrifice in blood.

You might want to take your cues from the players. Forget about what they say. None of them have ever said anything interesting. It’s incredible, actually. A Herculean feat of dreariness.

But how are they looking to you? Do they look the way you think you’d look if you weren’t afraid of Brad Marchand, even though you are very afraid of him?

After Tuesday’s game – which you’d think would be an emotional peak – the Leafs looked tired, bored and maybe just a little scared.

Someone asked Jake McCabe if he ever feels his nerves.

“No,” McCabe said. “Once you’re in it, you’re in it.”

That makes it sound as though playing the Bruins is the same as falling into the polar bear enclosure at the zoo. I’m not sure either of those scenarios is meant to turn out well.

“We’re going to keep fighting, keep believing, just trust in each other,” John Tavares said.

That’s Journey, right? 1981? The Escape tour? Absolute classic. I don’t know if Journey ‘won’ exactly, or who it had to come back against, but that is not a bad anthem.

The one who should worry you is the coach. Say this much for Sheldon Keefe – in an organization that doesn’t put ruthless self-examination at the core of its mission, he is less inclined than most to engage in magical thinking out loud.

The first clue was his description of the way the Leafs came out to start the game – which was better than it has been.

“We didn’t feel sorry for ourselves,” Keefe said. “We didn’t mail it in.”

What I’m hearing is that the Leafs have felt sorry for themselves, and have mailed it in. Just not on this particular night.

Keefe warmed to a back-and-forth description about what his team was feeling versus what Boston would feel, and how the Bruins’ feelings might have an impact on Toronto’s feelings.

“As difficult as this one was here tonight, the next one is going to be even harder,” he said.

It took Keefe a beat to realize that he seemed to be suggesting that Toronto is better in Boston than it is in Toronto. It is absolutely true, but the coach of Toronto can’t be seen to say that. So he tucked a “ … regardless of where the game is played,” in at the end.

(It will be and was always going to be played in Toronto. Where the Leafs have been atrocious.)

The last thing you want to do is ask yourself your position on disappointment. Philosophically speaking, how are you with letdowns? Are you a Schopenhauer type – the world is hell and men are the devils in it and that kind of thing? Then you may have enough emotional protection.

The thing that really links Leafs fans isn’t a shared love of Dave Keon, but a long, prideful streak of masochism.

Admit it – you like the Leafs bad. It reassures you that in the midst of a disorienting world, one thing can be counted on to stay the same. The sun comes up and the Leafs lose.

When that happens, you aren’t heartbroken – though that’s the word people use. Heartbreak implies you believed it would work out. You didn’t. You’re smart like that.

The feeling you get when the Leafs blow it again is closer to reassurance. Plus ça change, plus c’est la même core four.

Refusing to believe in the Leafs is proof you’re the real deal. Only someone who hasn’t been paying attention thinks this will change. Take solace in that.

Being a Leafs fan is knowing they won’t win, and pretending to believe anyway. It’s a lie you tell yourself because it makes you unhappy. But unhappy the way your dad taught you, and the way you will teach your kids.

So would I recommend you believe this time? After talking to you, I feel pretty confident you’ll be fine, one way (wink wink) or the other.