Dodgeball Changed My Life

I was always the last kid picked for basketball in middle school.  It seems that my limbs had grown so quickly that the control system took years to catch up.  Even though I often played hoops in my driveway, I just couldn't put it together when it counted.

The local name was Bombardment and it was a crowd favorite in that class they still want us to call "Physical Education."  The game started that day and soon I was the only one left with five remaining on the opposing team.

Ball in hand, I blocked a couple of shots and then dropped the ball to catch a long, arcing throw.  2 vs 5.  Then I took another kid out.  2 vs 4.  I caught another and the additional player shifted the momentum of the game so much that we won a couple of minutes later.

We must have played three or four games that day but that was the only one I recall.  No medal to hang around my scrawny neck - it was just gym class.  I doubt it made an impression on anyone else, but for some reason, I see that as a turning point in my life.  Soon people were picking me early for basketball games.  Then I started playing volleyball.

It seems that I realized that I wasn't the same monstrously tall, uncoordinated kid I used to be.  The control system was coordinating the motions of my spider limbs.

Confidence.  That's was it was all about.  Fake it.  Or take it.  And never give up.