Tag Archives: slam dunk

Death Penalty

Death penalty: (n) punishment by death for a crime

I am so happy that life is more like a motion picture than a brochure of photo shopped stills.

Honestly, if you had frozen my face, attitudes and beliefs at any one particular time in my life, I not only might have been contrary to you, but also at odds with my present incarnation.

There’s just too much to learn on this journey to ever be certain.

“Certain” is the profile taken by either fools or people who have enough money to pay for an alibi.

So I will freely tell you—there was a time when I was favorable, if not an advocate, for the death penalty.

My reasoning was not vengeance.

Rather, I cited the case of Charles Manson. I felt he was given a cruel and unusual punishment by having to live inside his own tormented brain the rest of his life. It seemed to me that capital punishment in a situation like that would actually be merciful.

Folks would “ooh and aah” over my insight–and I felt that I succeeded in killing off the bad guys and looking genteel at the same time.

Then one day, I opened the Good Book and read the story of Cain and Abel. According to this volume, Cain killed his brother, Abel, generating the first murder case.

When God caught up with Cain and spoke to him, He asked him why he was hiding and tried to get him to tell the truth. Though not totally successful, God, who had the power to take his life, instead exiles Cain. He goes, starts his own family and continues his breathing.

This gave me pause.

If God, who had a slam-dunk murder case against Cain, chose to give him the opportunity to live out a new possibility, who in the hell was I to lobby for the death of another soul?

I am not trying to insinuate that rehabilitation is successful.

I don’t think that someone who is massively cruel deserves to continue existing.

I just know that God chose not to execute the first murderer.

And He’s really the only judge,

For we all know there are many roads and detours before we arrive at our destination.

 

Cue Ball

Cue ball: (n) the ball a player strikes with the cue, as distinguished from the other balls on the table.

I insisted it was not fair.

Every time I played pool with my friends—Eight Ball—I did a great job clearing the balls on the table.

That is, until I got down to the cue ball and the eight ball.

Then it was time to put the eight ball away, naming the pocket where I planned to place it, thus closing the game with a slam-dunk.

Here was my problem.

Every time I got to that stage, I either hit the eight ball and it would go into a pocket I did not name, or more often, the cue ball followed the eight ball into the pocket, thus making me a loser.

I argued.

After all, I completed 90% of the task of winning the game. How could I lose the 90% over a 10% mistake?

It was unrighteous.

It was a plot.

It was un-American.

My friends didn’t care. “The rules say…”

That’s how they began every discussion, declaring me a loser.

I got to the point that I hated the cue ball. I feared it. Once I began fearing it, I was afraid to strike it with my stick.

Of course, if you can’t strike the cue ball with your stick, you won’t have a very good break at the beginning of the game. So I stopped wanting to have the first break—which certainly robbed me of an advantage. So I sat around, hoping someone would miss a shot since I had passed on breaking the balls.

All at once, a game I had been very efficient at playing I now despised.

All because of the cue ball.

That damned cue ball that followed the eight ball into the pocket.

Or the eight ball which refused to go to where I declared its home to be.

At no time did it occur to me that I could practice and become better. Why would you want to practice something that was unfair?

So I pouted.

After a while, when I went with my friends to play pool, I just sat and watched.

Soon I wouldn’t go along if they were going to play pool.

They, on the other hand, could never guarantee that pool wouldn’t crop up in the evening’s activities. So I started staying home.

I soon became a recluse. Nobody wanted to be around me.

Since I wasn’t going to be around people, I stopped bathing, didn’t shave and only occasionally brushed my teeth. My breath was repugnant, even to my own mouth.

Pretty soon people were praying for me instead of visiting me.

I went into a mental hospital and was diagnosed with a personality disorder.

I had to stay in my room, though, because the recreational area had a pool table and it sent me into a fit of rage.

I tried to overdose on aspirin but failed miserably.

You see? This is what can happen when you are viciously attacked by a cue ball.

Epilogue

By the way, everything I shared after the word “un-American” was completely made up—seeking your sympathy.

funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

 

Basketball

Basketball: (n) a game played between two teams of five players in which goals are scored by throwing a ball through a netted hoopDictionary B

I was the fattest kid in my class.

It is a distinction without appreciation.

But I liked basketball.

I started playing it when I was seven years old with another kid who ended up being a champion at hoops. So I was fairly good–especially for a fat boy.

But I did not look like a basketball player. This was troublesome to folks–because talent needs more than ability. It requires a “look.”

Basketball players are meant to be tall and skinny.

I was 5 foot 11—in every direction.

So when I joined the team there was a chuckle and a cynical ripple among my peers. When I competed, there was some amusement.

And when I made the first string, there were those who were astounded that there was nobody to beat me out, and grown-ups who thought I might run up and down the court and have a heart attack.

It’s been this way for me in everything in my life:

  • I am not an attractive man, so some of my friends thought I would never procure a woman.
  • I have short, stubby fingers, so most people thought it would be impossible for me to play piano.
  • I never went to college, so how do I have the audacity to compose and write?

More often than not, we require the “look” of basketball along with the skill.

And as fans, we often are not satisfied unless all the visuals are present … to accompany the slam dunk.

 

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