Moves Like Shaq

There was a time when I thought, no, I knew, basketball was my sport. All of my friends in middle school and high school were athletes and by tenth grade, every one of them were on the basketball team at school. Naturally, I felt left out because after 12 years straight of playing softball, I had lost the chance to acquire the skills needed for any other sport.

For example, the 5-second blitz rule in touch football bewildered me nor did I ever let it apply. If the quarterback is standing right there, with the ball, completely open, why on earth do I have to wait “5 Mississippi’s” before I can tag them!? I now understand that without blockers, being the quarterback in a touch game would be nearly impossible without a rule like that, but still, it seemed unfair. In fact, more often than not I would just tag the quarterback immediately and justify it by saying that I was simply a quick counter. I’m gifted I guess.

Anyway, the girls on my softball teams were never exactly the friendly type, and by the time I was in high school, I was feeling both burnt out and left out since my friends spent their afternoons together at basketball. That’s when I knew basketball needed to become my sport.

I joined a community basketball league in hopes that I could learn the rules fast enough to think about joining the school team. My community team had a wide range of skill amongst the players, so it’s unfortunate when I say that I was one of the best on the team. Not to toot my own horn or anything, but I was a pretty good at shooting and dribbling. I was fairly unaggressive though, and couldn’t resist flinching and moving my feet during a screen, so I was taken off the list for defensive positions.  By process of elimination, the position I was put at was….point guard. That’s right. The leader of each play, the ball carrier, the player expected to know what was happening on the court at all times.

It’s beyond me why the coach thought I could play this position without knowing any of the rules, but he put me there anyway. After that season, this is what I could tell you about the game of basketball: my job was to run back and forth across the court dribbling the ball. That’s all I knew and know now.

Maybe I should blame the coach, who was well informed that I had never played basketball before (yes Coach, as shocking as it may be, I’m 15 and have never played a formal game of basketball). Or maybe it’s my parents’ fault for not teaching me the rules of other sports during my childhood. Maybe it’s even my own fault for not reading up on the rules before signing up for a team. I hear Basketball for Dummies works wonders.

Anyway, I guess all of these factors played a part in making my days of basketball fame short-lived. By the last game of the season, we had not won one single game.  This was our last chance to break our defeated streak. I, obviously, was playing point guard for the entire game and I was feeling confident and ready to make this one count. With a couple minutes left, I made a steal from an opposing player that created uproar from the crowd. And by crowd, I mean the six or seven parents that consistently attended our games.

With a close score and now having possession of the ball, I was sure this was the break my team needed to get ahead. I dribbled as fast as I could, leaving the other team behind with only the whip of my ponytail as I ran. I was going to run to the other end of the court and make my lay up and my team, the Comets, would win their first community league basketball game. I ran, dodged, faked, dodged again, kept running, and then….the whistle blew. Uh excuse me ref, I’m only at half court…I haven’t made my winning shot yet.

“OVER AND BACK.” …what? Nuh uh! Wait, what’s over and back? It doesn’t even matter I had an open court ahead of me! Turns out, no. No I didn’t. I had completely forgotten about the fact that my steal was not in fact a steal. It was taking the ball back after an opposing player had stolen it from us. Therefore, of COURSE they weren’t going to chase me into that “open court” space I had ahead. That was their side. I was carrying the ball away from our basket and going to shoot for them.

Luckily, this isn’t one of those horror stories that you see on TV where the young child runs and scores for the wrong team, jumping and cheering feeling so damn proud of themselves that it breaks your heart. But it was still pretty humiliating. The awkward stares from my teammates, the smug grins from the other team, and my parents awkwardly clapping since they got excited any time the ball was passed in my general direction.   

But…that was the day I knew that basketball wasn’t, nor will it ever be, my sport. That was my first and last season as a basketball player. I can’t say that I learned a lot, or that I had a lot of fun doing it, but at least I did it….Next up, soccer.

Revolving Chamber of Death

This is a continuation of one of my previous posts, “WARNING: Penn State Campus Lies Ahead.”  This is a story about the time I got stuck in the revolving door at Pattee Library.

It was just like any ordinary fall day at Penn State, cool but sunny. I had decided to spend my break between classes in the library reading as I sometimes do, so I entered through the push/pull doors of the Paterno (northern) side of the library, headed to the third floor and proceeded to have a pleasant 2 hours of quiet reading time. My next class was in Willard, south of the library, so naturally I chose to leave out the other side.

Now, I actually had often avoided this entrance as much as possible because I’ve always had an apprehension about revolving doors. I’m extremely uncomfortable with the fact that the speed of the door can change and rely on the person that enters before or after you. You can be walking at a relaxing pace, thinking you are going to make it calmly into whatever building you are entering, and that can change in an instant if God forbid the guy behind you is late for a meeting. Suddenly not only he is running through the door, but you and everyone else in any of the quadrants have been taken to a sprint completely against their will. There’s just something not right about that.

Anyway, on this particular day, that apprehension turned into a distinct fear of these doors. As usual, I waited like a child boarding an escalator for the first time in order to gauge the speed of the door and a space that I could dive into the door. When people began to line up behind me I figured it was my time to go for it whether I could find the perfect break or not, so I walked toward the door and hopped in the first open space.

I will never know what happened in the next 3 seconds that shrunk that door space from the normal 4 foot space to approximately one foot, but whatever occurred had me trapped in a space in which I could not move my feet one in front of the other. I’ll also add now that in addition to revolving doors I have a slight fear of small spaces, otherwise known as claustrophobia. In this very instant, two of my fears were slapping me in the face in the form of a glass door. I continued to push, fall really, into the door pane in front of me and as it moved my feet shuffled below me. I could see through the glass that the line of students flowing through the library doors had come to a halt and most of them were looking to see what the hold up was. That would be me. My body, still stuck in the right side of this revolving door at Pattee.

I’m not quite sure how long I was actually stuck in the door, but in my mind it felt like 5 minutes. As more and more people gathered outside of the door, I started to wonder if they were now lining up to get into the library or to simply watch me struggle. Somehow I had finally shuffled far enough to see daylight and I burst through the opening like I had never experienced a breath of oxygen.

Now I had to decide what to do with myself to minimize the humiliation I felt as everyone watched in shock, probably never having witnessed a human having such a struggle with a manmade object. I decided to do what any self-respecting person might do after they fall face-first on the ground. Get back up and act like nothing happened. So, I stood up straight and continued walking at a normal pace, took out my cell phone, and began texting every single person I knew about what had just happened.

Cher Impersonator for Hire

One of the hobbies I enjoy most throughout my everyday life is music. I sing quite a bit, or should I say, belt. I’ll tell you that I have an okay singing voice when the volume is at an appropriate level, but once I hit a certain decibel, I’ll admit it becomes very unpleasant.

Due to this, I’m well known amongst my friends for my Cher impression. I have a low range of notes I can hit, so naturally she is my first choice when it comes to choosing a number I can belt all the way through. I just hope to God I don’t sound like this girl.

I sing during most of my daily activities whether I’m cooking, doing my hair, etc. And don’t try to get in my way during shower time. “If I Could Turn Back Time: Shower Style” is one of my most popular performances, occasionally requested by my roommates.

This love for Cher stems from an early friendship my sister and I had with my mom’s best friend’s son (complicated, I know). He’s the most unique, talented person I know, currently living in NYC trying to make it as an actor and singer. He loved Cher as a kid and decided that I, at the age of 10, with my tiny frame of under 70 pounds would make the perfect “Cher” for the shows we put on for our parents. He and my sister threw a jumbled, gaudy black wig on my head making me look like a 40-year old prostitute on the morning after. But once Cher’s music started blasting through our stereo system, the hot pants and leafy fall decorations (in other words, the most bizarre costumes we could possibly put together from our parents’ storage closets) didn’t matter anymore. We were all taken to a place that was filled with so much joy, laughter, and pure enjoyment of our new-found stardom, and I think that’s why I still love theater and music so much today.

My childhood with Cher is something I’ll never forget. It’s funny how much those little weekend shows can affect my life this many years later, but it’s helped me to realize that growing up is about the little moments that still make you who you are. I loved those happy childhood memories, and now, here I am, snapping my fingers to Cher and wondering what will come next.  Do you believe in life after love?