Eras end. Time goes by. Jim Carrey makes more movies. We understand all this. That doesn't mean we have to like it.

It was hard not to notice how happy Patrick Roy looked announcing his retirement. In fact, he seemed a lot happier than anyone else in the room, except possibly his kids, and even they didn't seem all that excited about moving back to Canada.

His youngest, Jana, actually got the microphone to ask him why they had to. Roy did not tell her they would discuss it when they got home, which shows you what a good mood he was in.

Pierre Lacroix, on the other hand, was a mess. Some will say that's because of their 20-year association, or Roy taking him places Lacroix never dreamed of going.

Maybe, but I can't help thinking somewhere in the back of his mind Lacroix also knows things just got much tougher for the team he's still running. This sunset isn't for him.

So Lacroix said all the things Mike Shanahan said four years ago when John Elway walked away on a much more emotional note. The heir is waiting in the wings, he said, mentioning the organizational suspects. If you're David Aebischer, you might want to ring up Brian Griese and find out how that went.

When Lacroix recalled driving home the night he traded for Roy 7 1/2 years ago — he knows the date — he choked up. Roy just smiled.

``It was Dec. 6, and I remember it like yesterday,'' Lacroix said. ``About 3 a.m. in the morning of the trade . . . ''

His voice quavered. ``Sorry,'' he said. ``I was driving home. And in my quiet reflection, I knew he could be the backstop of this young franchise and bring us to the next level. I anticipated that he would have a big impact, and he sure did.''

And now it's over. The best just went past tense, and it will never be the same.

``He's ready to move on,'' Joe Sakic said, ``and we all have to.''

That's the deal. Roy is ready. The rest of us are ready or not.

This day could have come a year ago. Roy intended to retire then. As it happened, it was the best season of his career, so he had to find out if he could do better.

``I love challenge,'' he explained.

But last season went the other way, and his question was answered. It was as if he realized, quite suddenly, that there must be easier things than living up to the legend of Patrick Roy.

``I really feel that I emptied the tank and I'm ready to move on,'' he said.

No tears. No trembling chin. It was the same quality we have watched on the ice. There were those, especially in Detroit, who called it arrogance. But it's not arrogance if you're right.

In fact, the quality was an uncanny certainty. Arrogance is how that looks from the outside. Roy has always known what to do, for certain, even if he turned out to be wrong, which wasn't often.

You recall the criticism of his Statue of Liberty pose in the Western Conference finals a year ago, a show of hubris, they said, when the puck dropped to the ice, and onto Brendan Shanahan's stick.

Then you watch the highlight reel the Avalanche put together, and it's all hubris, all Statue of Liberty, that pose of triumph and mastery that said he would always make the save and then show it to you. Always.

It wasn't always, of course. It couldn't be, or the game wouldn't be very interesting. It only seemed that way.

Someone asked him which high-powered scorer scared him the most coming at him on a breakaway.

``There's none,'' he said. ``You see there's one thing hasn't changed, eh?''

He was as certain he could stop a breakaway as he is that skating away now is the right thing. It seems inscrutable only to those of us who have no idea what such certainty feels like.

``I remember with Mike Keane on the plane on our way to Colorado, and I was very nervous, and Keaner said, 'Hey, just be yourself,' '' Roy remembered, flashing back to '95.

``I have to be honest. It was probably the best thing that ever happened to us.''

Didn't work out too bad for us, either.

Roy and Elway, separately but contemporaneously, brought prestige to a town, a state, an undiscovered time zone. We chugged along behind them, onto the map.

Now Roy follows Elway off the stage and we're back to where we were — mortals watching mortals, wouldas and couldas, the occasional wistful, backward glance.

``He's the best that's ever played,'' Sakic said, ``so that's going to leave a void.''

That would be the word.

Roy takes his leave with characteristic resolve. I hope he doesn't mind if we're not quite as happy about it as he is.

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