Crisis Moment

I'm guarding a guy who looks like my mirror image: white six footer in his mid-thirties. A little bulk around the middle. But I can't hold him. He drains threes in my face. I get closer and he goes by me. The little twat. He's got these baby blue North Carolina shorts on. You know, the ones with the argyle pattern on the sides. So pretentious. For someone who takes pride in his defensive prowess, I'm a little down. If I can't hold a guy like this, maybe it's time to do something else... It's a basketball crisis moment on a sunny day in April in Berkeley.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. There's of basketball to discuss here. It's been a long road to get to this YMCA. Really, the road starts back in Houston about eight months ago. The Houston Downtown Y. There are rumors that Joel Osteen hoops it up there. I never saw him and I played my fair share of ball there.

Hoops at the Houston Y all started with my job at the city's alt weekly paper, where I was working as a sort-of staff writer. Ok, it was a glorified internship for a corporate newspaper--no reason to put lipstick on that pig. It was a miserable job, miserable people, and I was looking for a lunchtime game. The Houston Y has the right personality for a gritty pick up game. For starters, it smells like 50 years of old man sweat. You notice it when you first walk up the stairs to the front door.



Second, the gym is poorly lit, like a good dive bar. You can't really make out the faces of the guys you're playing against, nor would you want to. There's the Serbian Terror, Mr. T, Mr. Miyagi, a few 50-something wannabe coaches who alternately pout and scream.

Houston is big enough that two games are always running: there are the aging players who were legitimately good players in high school or even college, and then there's the game for old guys...