The Hoops
Lou Gaglia
During his summer bike rides, he counted eight basketball hoops in neighborhood driveways but never saw anyone ever shoot at one. On his block alone there were five lonely hoops, including one that had been offered to neighbors online because the family was moving. He liked that one most, and they were letting it go for free, but he had to think about it first. Mei reminded him of his shoulder. He hadn’t shot a basketball for maybe twenty years. Before they moved upstate from New York City, he heaved a long jumper inside the neighborhood gym and couldn’t lift his arm for years. Later he was able to play catch with his son-(baseball was his first love anyway), but he wouldn’t try shooting a basketball again, not at the elementary school and not back in his city neighborhood whenever he visited there. But now, he’d counted eight or maybe nine hoops in neighborhood driveways, and he found himself shooting at those hoops in his mind, or following through on a shot as he passed, using no ball, just going through the shooting motion.
The elementary school was the turn-around spot for his daily bike rides, but lately he’d been staying at the school longer. The parking lot was often near empty. The only cars there were near the swimming pool, so he rode around the lot for a half hour, making a game of looping in turn around the alternating painted lines at the far end. It took him a few days to figure out how to alternate two lines at a time, then end up in perfect position to turn around naturally and complete another lap. He had to get it all down on paper before he finally figured it out, with his college freshman daughter’s help.
He was “stupid Ray” as a kid. His sisters would call him that. He didn’t know how to change a spark plug, even after his father showed him how several times. When he finally got it right, his father smiled and told him to remember, but next time he’d forget all over again. It was being watched that made him forget, that made him nervous, that made him “stupid Ray” to his sisters. He never forgot how to throw a baseball, though, or hit one. He did a lot of that as a kid. And in his teens he loved playing basketball as much he loved baseball. The only hoop he could shoot at was Jimmy Dee’s hoop around the block. Jimmy Dee would sit on his steps and wait for him to be done. He didn’t like Ray shooting there, but he never said anything, Ray would wave at Jimmy, or give him a little nod, but Jimmy wouldn’t budge. One night he shot until well after Jimmy went back inside his house. It was the best he’d ever shot, foul shot after foul shot, swishing many of them but not counting his makes or misses now. When he got home one night, his mother was at the door waiting.
“You got bigger” she said, “but I can still use a bat.”
When he was little, she’d given him some very hard beatings. A thrown shoe sometimes missed him, so she’d grab him and hit him with the heel instead. The wooden or metal spoons were other weapons. She seemed to go for them most often, but he hated the metal spoon most. Often, the beatings were for laughing too much, or for not wanting to put away his baseball cards, or for staying out too late shooting baskets or throwing baseballs in the park. He couldn’t remember other reasons, only the hitting. His sisters would escape beatings by circling the dining room table out of reach, then running outside, but he always somehow cornered himself on the couch in the den, where she slapped him many times, striking him wherever he left an opening—the face, the ass, the head…. His sisters laughed at him for screaming, and they laughed because he’d run himself into a corner. But then, starting when he was 16, he often shot around at Jimmy Dee’s hoop and came home after dark.
There was a basketball hoop in back of the elementary school, too. It even had a crummy net. But the last time he’d ever shot a basketball was in New York City twenty years before when he tried that much-too-long line-drive shot and felt a sharp pain in his shoulder. It wouldn’t go away, so he stopped playing basketball altogether. Later he could throw a baseball with his son again, but he didn’t want to push matters by trying basketball, so he gave it up completely for twenty years.
But when the neighbor offered the hoop, he said he might take it. He checked out the elementary school’s outside hoop. It had a worn-out net. Then he circled the parking lot a few times and kept riding back and checking it out, imagining a new net there and him swishing one shot after another, like when he was in his late teens and shot a hundred foul shots a day at a hoop his father had bought for him. He forgot why his father did that. Maybe it was because every night after dinner, he’d walked all the way around the block to shoot in front of Jimmy Dee’s house, even though he knew that Dee didn’t like him shooting there and couldn’t wait for him to leave.
Not long after, when circling the school parking lot, he checked out the school’s hoop again and decided that they would never put up a decent net. So he decided to take the neighbor’s hoop himself. At home, Mei warned him about his shoulder. For a couple of years after his injury, he couldn’t even reach for a spaghetti box in the cabinet with that arm, but now he could do that and throw a baseball again, no problem. Mei warned him anyway, suggesting he stick to baseball, but that night he told the neighbor online that he would take it anyway. He had to shoot again, he told Mei. His shoulder was fine now. He could throw a baseball no problem, so shooting a basketball would okay too. He wouldn’t take any long crazy shots, he promised, but she didn’t answer.
On the day that he set up the hoop, he listened to Mozart’s concerto for clarinet and felt as he had as a lonely teen when he listened to certain parts. A mournful clarinet played the main theme, followed by the full orchestra repeating it. Then there was the Adagio, when the full orchestra restated the theme played by the lonely clarinet, as though in full support of it. As he drove and listened, he was his teen self again. He was in high school when he often listened to that piece --- too shy about girls and in love with several in turn without saying a word to any of them. The clarinet and orchestra made him that teen again---shooting hoops alone on the patio or at Jimmy Dee’s and wishing for one of those girls to like him a little, or a lot somehow. He played the concerto for over an hour, then only played the Adagio, when the orchestra came in, as though to support the lonely clarinet, and support him too somehow.
When he got home, he told Mei he would take the hoop, and he went with his son to pick it up. He would shoot the next morning, and count how many foul shots he made out of 100—see if he could shoot over 70 percent again, No Jimmy Dee to stare him down, and no mom to beat the shit out him when he came home too late.
Mei reminded him of his shoulder, but he said he was all right, that he wouldn’t shoot from deep at all and would try shooting lefty like Larry Bird did sometimes. She had no answer, knowing that Bird was his hero.
A baseball family was staying next door to their house. This summer and the summer before, baseball families stayed in neighbors’ houses a week at a time and went to Cooperstown All-Star Village for games during the day. He heard them at night having fun in the neighbor’s pools. He saw some of them in the daytime too. Often he would see one boy or another race into his back or front yard to retrieve a ball that had gotten away or sailed over the neighbor’s fence. As he stood dribbling his basketball in front of his new hoop, he saw a baseball fly from the neighbor’s back yard over the fence and into his front yard. Soon a boy raced from the backyard and picked up the ball. Before the kid could run back, he called to the boy, who stopped and looked back at him, fear in his eyes.
“Hey,” he said to the boy. “If the ball comes over the fence, just come and get it. It’s no big deal.” The kid nodded and went into the garage, and he went into his house and told Mei, who agreed that they could come any time. He was no Jimmy Dee, he said to her, and explained who Jimmy Dee was, and she agreed that of course he wasn’t Jimmy Dee.
After lunch, he finally shot at his hoop a little, but he only practiced lefty shots. He would take his 100 righty foul shots that night, or in the morning like when he was a teen.
In the afternoon he rode his bike to the school park, holding his basketball, and after a while he went to the back of the school where the hoop was.
A bunch of boys were already there shooting. He watched them heave long wild shots that often sailed past the backboard onto the grass or in high weeds near a stream. Finally he went over to them.
“Hey. No bank shots?” he asked, and they looked at him a little warily.” Why don’t you guys have contest or something?” he said. “See how many bank shots you each can hit. See who does best. And he demonstrated, but with his left hand. “Find the spot on the backboard that will let the ball carom into the net easily. The one who makes the most bankshots wins.”
“Wins what?” one of them asked.
“I don’t know. “You all can chip in for an ice cream for the winner. You guys need a challenge. Just take bank shots though. No long, crazy heaves I see you guys shooting from way too far sometimes. Better to get closer and hit easy bank shots. Easy baskets win games.”
They went for it then. Each of them was allowed three shots a turn. He had to bank it in off the backboard and through the net. Some of them were awful at it, but after a while, some of them hit bank shot after bank shot. They kept score themselves, and the winner made 15 bank shots and wore a huge smile. He promised the winner a Friendly’s ice cream, and gave him 20 bucks and asked him to treat the rest. “And next time,” he said to them, “get a little closer to bank them in. You guys were all shooting from way too deep, clanging from everywhere. You want to score, not look good missing.
They laughed then, and he got on his bike and waved to them as he went.
Later, at home, he couldn’t find his Mozart Concerto disk, which he’d listened to every night. He hadn’t left it in the car or on his desk. The day before, he had organized all of his many CDs, but now that one, the one he wanted to listen to most, was gone. After an hour of looking everywhere, he gave up. Mei told him to buy another one, but he sat at the living room table, brooding. Of course it was gone, he said He’d always lost things, even as a kid. After an hour of looking, he gave up and watched an old basketball game. It was game 4 of the 1984 NBA championship. Bird had a great game, and there were even a couple of fights. He enjoyed the game over some wine and imagined himself making shots---Bird-like bank shots in his own driveway the next day. Still, the music—the Adagio—was in his head all night, and Mei rubbed his arm so he could finally relax and fall asleep.
The next morning he was outside in his driveway soon after breakfast. He shot short bankers right and left-handed. Several went off the rim into the street, and he had to chase them down. Later, he ended up making 52 of 100 foul shots and was very happy with that. His shoulder ached, but he was most happy about the shots he’d swished through the net with no rim or backboard help. He went inside for a drink. Mei was happy he’d played again and said she would rub down his sore arm later. He said it was only a little sore, but it was starting to kill him, just as it had years before at the city gym.
When he went back outside, through the garage, he saw them---the same kids from the park the day before. Some stood close to the driveway and others were on the grass or across the street.
“I just put this up a few days ago,” he said to them. “If you guys want to shoot around here it’s all right with me, any time. Just come over, no big deal. Practice your layups and bankers, though. The easy points.” And then he went back inside for another arm rub from Mei, taking imaginary shots as he went through the garage, going through the shooting motion and making sure to follow through.
Later, he told Mei that he would buy the Mozart concerto again, and when it arrived he would revisit his teen years in his mind. And promised to be a lot nicer to the kid that he used to be.
Lou Gaglia
During his summer bike rides, he counted eight basketball hoops in neighborhood driveways but never saw anyone ever shoot at one. On his block alone there were five lonely hoops, including one that had been offered to neighbors online because the family was moving. He liked that one most, and they were letting it go for free, but he had to think about it first. Mei reminded him of his shoulder. He hadn’t shot a basketball for maybe twenty years. Before they moved upstate from New York City, he heaved a long jumper inside the neighborhood gym and couldn’t lift his arm for years. Later he was able to play catch with his son-(baseball was his first love anyway), but he wouldn’t try shooting a basketball again, not at the elementary school and not back in his city neighborhood whenever he visited there. But now, he’d counted eight or maybe nine hoops in neighborhood driveways, and he found himself shooting at those hoops in his mind, or following through on a shot as he passed, using no ball, just going through the shooting motion.
The elementary school was the turn-around spot for his daily bike rides, but lately he’d been staying at the school longer. The parking lot was often near empty. The only cars there were near the swimming pool, so he rode around the lot for a half hour, making a game of looping in turn around the alternating painted lines at the far end. It took him a few days to figure out how to alternate two lines at a time, then end up in perfect position to turn around naturally and complete another lap. He had to get it all down on paper before he finally figured it out, with his college freshman daughter’s help.
He was “stupid Ray” as a kid. His sisters would call him that. He didn’t know how to change a spark plug, even after his father showed him how several times. When he finally got it right, his father smiled and told him to remember, but next time he’d forget all over again. It was being watched that made him forget, that made him nervous, that made him “stupid Ray” to his sisters. He never forgot how to throw a baseball, though, or hit one. He did a lot of that as a kid. And in his teens he loved playing basketball as much he loved baseball. The only hoop he could shoot at was Jimmy Dee’s hoop around the block. Jimmy Dee would sit on his steps and wait for him to be done. He didn’t like Ray shooting there, but he never said anything, Ray would wave at Jimmy, or give him a little nod, but Jimmy wouldn’t budge. One night he shot until well after Jimmy went back inside his house. It was the best he’d ever shot, foul shot after foul shot, swishing many of them but not counting his makes or misses now. When he got home one night, his mother was at the door waiting.
“You got bigger” she said, “but I can still use a bat.”
When he was little, she’d given him some very hard beatings. A thrown shoe sometimes missed him, so she’d grab him and hit him with the heel instead. The wooden or metal spoons were other weapons. She seemed to go for them most often, but he hated the metal spoon most. Often, the beatings were for laughing too much, or for not wanting to put away his baseball cards, or for staying out too late shooting baskets or throwing baseballs in the park. He couldn’t remember other reasons, only the hitting. His sisters would escape beatings by circling the dining room table out of reach, then running outside, but he always somehow cornered himself on the couch in the den, where she slapped him many times, striking him wherever he left an opening—the face, the ass, the head…. His sisters laughed at him for screaming, and they laughed because he’d run himself into a corner. But then, starting when he was 16, he often shot around at Jimmy Dee’s hoop and came home after dark.
There was a basketball hoop in back of the elementary school, too. It even had a crummy net. But the last time he’d ever shot a basketball was in New York City twenty years before when he tried that much-too-long line-drive shot and felt a sharp pain in his shoulder. It wouldn’t go away, so he stopped playing basketball altogether. Later he could throw a baseball with his son again, but he didn’t want to push matters by trying basketball, so he gave it up completely for twenty years.
But when the neighbor offered the hoop, he said he might take it. He checked out the elementary school’s outside hoop. It had a worn-out net. Then he circled the parking lot a few times and kept riding back and checking it out, imagining a new net there and him swishing one shot after another, like when he was in his late teens and shot a hundred foul shots a day at a hoop his father had bought for him. He forgot why his father did that. Maybe it was because every night after dinner, he’d walked all the way around the block to shoot in front of Jimmy Dee’s house, even though he knew that Dee didn’t like him shooting there and couldn’t wait for him to leave.
Not long after, when circling the school parking lot, he checked out the school’s hoop again and decided that they would never put up a decent net. So he decided to take the neighbor’s hoop himself. At home, Mei warned him about his shoulder. For a couple of years after his injury, he couldn’t even reach for a spaghetti box in the cabinet with that arm, but now he could do that and throw a baseball again, no problem. Mei warned him anyway, suggesting he stick to baseball, but that night he told the neighbor online that he would take it anyway. He had to shoot again, he told Mei. His shoulder was fine now. He could throw a baseball no problem, so shooting a basketball would okay too. He wouldn’t take any long crazy shots, he promised, but she didn’t answer.
On the day that he set up the hoop, he listened to Mozart’s concerto for clarinet and felt as he had as a lonely teen when he listened to certain parts. A mournful clarinet played the main theme, followed by the full orchestra repeating it. Then there was the Adagio, when the full orchestra restated the theme played by the lonely clarinet, as though in full support of it. As he drove and listened, he was his teen self again. He was in high school when he often listened to that piece --- too shy about girls and in love with several in turn without saying a word to any of them. The clarinet and orchestra made him that teen again---shooting hoops alone on the patio or at Jimmy Dee’s and wishing for one of those girls to like him a little, or a lot somehow. He played the concerto for over an hour, then only played the Adagio, when the orchestra came in, as though to support the lonely clarinet, and support him too somehow.
When he got home, he told Mei he would take the hoop, and he went with his son to pick it up. He would shoot the next morning, and count how many foul shots he made out of 100—see if he could shoot over 70 percent again, No Jimmy Dee to stare him down, and no mom to beat the shit out him when he came home too late.
Mei reminded him of his shoulder, but he said he was all right, that he wouldn’t shoot from deep at all and would try shooting lefty like Larry Bird did sometimes. She had no answer, knowing that Bird was his hero.
A baseball family was staying next door to their house. This summer and the summer before, baseball families stayed in neighbors’ houses a week at a time and went to Cooperstown All-Star Village for games during the day. He heard them at night having fun in the neighbor’s pools. He saw some of them in the daytime too. Often he would see one boy or another race into his back or front yard to retrieve a ball that had gotten away or sailed over the neighbor’s fence. As he stood dribbling his basketball in front of his new hoop, he saw a baseball fly from the neighbor’s back yard over the fence and into his front yard. Soon a boy raced from the backyard and picked up the ball. Before the kid could run back, he called to the boy, who stopped and looked back at him, fear in his eyes.
“Hey,” he said to the boy. “If the ball comes over the fence, just come and get it. It’s no big deal.” The kid nodded and went into the garage, and he went into his house and told Mei, who agreed that they could come any time. He was no Jimmy Dee, he said to her, and explained who Jimmy Dee was, and she agreed that of course he wasn’t Jimmy Dee.
After lunch, he finally shot at his hoop a little, but he only practiced lefty shots. He would take his 100 righty foul shots that night, or in the morning like when he was a teen.
In the afternoon he rode his bike to the school park, holding his basketball, and after a while he went to the back of the school where the hoop was.
A bunch of boys were already there shooting. He watched them heave long wild shots that often sailed past the backboard onto the grass or in high weeds near a stream. Finally he went over to them.
“Hey. No bank shots?” he asked, and they looked at him a little warily.” Why don’t you guys have contest or something?” he said. “See how many bank shots you each can hit. See who does best. And he demonstrated, but with his left hand. “Find the spot on the backboard that will let the ball carom into the net easily. The one who makes the most bankshots wins.”
“Wins what?” one of them asked.
“I don’t know. “You all can chip in for an ice cream for the winner. You guys need a challenge. Just take bank shots though. No long, crazy heaves I see you guys shooting from way too far sometimes. Better to get closer and hit easy bank shots. Easy baskets win games.”
They went for it then. Each of them was allowed three shots a turn. He had to bank it in off the backboard and through the net. Some of them were awful at it, but after a while, some of them hit bank shot after bank shot. They kept score themselves, and the winner made 15 bank shots and wore a huge smile. He promised the winner a Friendly’s ice cream, and gave him 20 bucks and asked him to treat the rest. “And next time,” he said to them, “get a little closer to bank them in. You guys were all shooting from way too deep, clanging from everywhere. You want to score, not look good missing.
They laughed then, and he got on his bike and waved to them as he went.
Later, at home, he couldn’t find his Mozart Concerto disk, which he’d listened to every night. He hadn’t left it in the car or on his desk. The day before, he had organized all of his many CDs, but now that one, the one he wanted to listen to most, was gone. After an hour of looking everywhere, he gave up. Mei told him to buy another one, but he sat at the living room table, brooding. Of course it was gone, he said He’d always lost things, even as a kid. After an hour of looking, he gave up and watched an old basketball game. It was game 4 of the 1984 NBA championship. Bird had a great game, and there were even a couple of fights. He enjoyed the game over some wine and imagined himself making shots---Bird-like bank shots in his own driveway the next day. Still, the music—the Adagio—was in his head all night, and Mei rubbed his arm so he could finally relax and fall asleep.
The next morning he was outside in his driveway soon after breakfast. He shot short bankers right and left-handed. Several went off the rim into the street, and he had to chase them down. Later, he ended up making 52 of 100 foul shots and was very happy with that. His shoulder ached, but he was most happy about the shots he’d swished through the net with no rim or backboard help. He went inside for a drink. Mei was happy he’d played again and said she would rub down his sore arm later. He said it was only a little sore, but it was starting to kill him, just as it had years before at the city gym.
When he went back outside, through the garage, he saw them---the same kids from the park the day before. Some stood close to the driveway and others were on the grass or across the street.
“I just put this up a few days ago,” he said to them. “If you guys want to shoot around here it’s all right with me, any time. Just come over, no big deal. Practice your layups and bankers, though. The easy points.” And then he went back inside for another arm rub from Mei, taking imaginary shots as he went through the garage, going through the shooting motion and making sure to follow through.
Later, he told Mei that he would buy the Mozart concerto again, and when it arrived he would revisit his teen years in his mind. And promised to be a lot nicer to the kid that he used to be.
