Basketball has always mattered a lot to me.
And for a long time, probably because I thought I should, I'd dismiss its importance--or pretend to--if I feared criticism of how much I cared about basketball in relation to worthier things.
It isn't that I was ever particularly good at basketball--much to my chagrin. I just grew up with it. So I loved it.
My dad and I would watch so much basketball. We'd go outside and play on the hoop affixed above our garage. And I'd come back inside and play a little more, on a Jordan Jammer.
And I was spoiled rotten by the teams we'd watch--Duke basketball during the rise of Coach K before he became Coach K. And along with nearly every other 1980s kid, Michael Jordan's Bulls before the Bulls had broken through the Pistons and Celtics.
The game helped me create and build friendships--hell, it still does--from elementary school through high school where I averaged more floors slapped than points scored for my varsity team; in college, where I made fast friends who were as eager as I to be front row, center court in Cameron Indoor Stadium.
And now, watching our six-year-old embrace the game over the last year has been indescribably fun. His big Christmas present from Santa was his first regulation-size hoop, on which we'd play lots of 2-on-2, with Teddy mostly having to be held by either Lori or me and Elijah mostly driving to the hoop and working on his interior game while we feigned defense. And in the evenings, under his direction, Lori and I would make brackets for Elijah so that he could play out the NBA playoffs on his Jordan Jammer-like hoop in our family room.
Or at least, that's how it was.
One of the unexpected aspects of my physical recovery has been coping with what I've decided to call "lost time." I remember just about everything from the morning of July 15th. I carried Teddy to the car so I could take him to a checkup at Nationwide Children's Hospital; we were driving along and singing music as we usually did; traffic on 670 was at a standstill; in my rearview mirror was a car that was zooming toward us.
And that's where I lost time. I have blurry memories that, as best I can guess it, started about a week later even though I was alert and conscious prior to then. And for another week or two, though I can remember more, I sure don't remember much with precision. I'm told this is both due to the extent of my brain injury, as well as the smorgasbord of medications they had me on to help with this, that, or the other.
I began to really come to just prior to leaving Grant Hospital's ICU. I remember watching some of the World Cup. I remember more of the people who came to see me. I remember more of the faces of the nurses who were taking care of me. And I remember someone asking me, in assessing the extent of my physical limitations but forecasting my forthcoming rehabilitation period, what I wanted to be able to do first.
"I want to be able to play basketball again with Elijah."
~
Duke basketball was extremely important to my father and me. It was particularly important to my father. He went to Duke on a full academic scholarship, and by all accounts had but three places he'd frequent during his four years: His classrooms, the library, and Cameron Indoor Stadium.
We only watched one game together in Cameron though: A Blue-White Scrimmage, at his 20th college reunion, in 1989. We met Coach K that morning, as it were. We'd bumped into him at breakfast. I took the envelope for Dad's reunion over to Coach K and asked for his autograph. He signed it, "Always try your best." I reminded Coach K of that twenty-five years later, when I interviewed him for the student newspaper.
I called Dad as I walked out of the interview and told him. My dad said I'm glad you did.
The next summer, I was walking out of Duke's student fitness center while Coach K was walking in--he used to play a lot of squash. I didn't think Coach K would remember me, of course, so I was just going to pass him by. But he said, "Michael, how are you?"
"I'm great, Coach! How're you?"
He stopped and said, "Mike, have you been working out? You look great!"
"WHY YES! I have been, Coach! Thank you so much!"
"So are you ready?" he asked.
"Ready? For what, Coach?"
"Well, walk-on tryouts are in a few weeks!"
I was speechless. And before I could respond, he began to cackle.
"You could never make my team!"
And he laughed and laughed as he went into the gym.
Dad loved that story. And when Dad died, my mom and I knew that one of the ways in which we would celebrate and memorialize him was by getting his name in that arena somehow. So now there's a window in Cameron with a plaque beside it. And every time I get back to Cameron, I take a photo with it.
In one of my sleepless nights at Ohio State's rehabilitation facility, I was thinking about my most recent trip to Durham. It had been in February, right around the 21st anniversary of my father's passing. I went with my beloved college roommates, two of the people I'd befriended fast when I was an 18-year-old freshman, and with whom we'd spent far too much time in and around Duke basketball.
I'd just written about the trip--and my father, and America--for Ohio Humanities in their annual periodical. And in the haze of my recovery one early morning, I'd wondered if I might wake up from this nightmare and be back on the drive home from Durham, to see my wife and sons again.
As my treatments continued, my occupational therapist asked what I wanted to be able to do as I recovered. And I told her, I want to be play basketball with Elijah. And for some reason, OSU's Dodd Hall has an outdoor court. So out we went. And much to my delight, I could dribble a little--I couldn't raise my hands above my head yet, but anything low, I could do.
A few days later, I tried shooting--but like Rick Barry used to, underhand. Lori took some photos and video, and showed them to Elijah. Look, Dad's getting better.
When I first came home, and Elijah saw me for the first time since the accident, the very first thing he wanted to do was play basketball. So we did. And he shot underhand like me, to make the game fair. Because he's an extraordinary six-year-old.
And as my treatments and my recovery have continued since, as my face has gone from droopy to normal, with my arms back above my head and my wits a little bit more about me every day, the basketball we play is closer and closer to resembling this game that matters far too much to me, and just enough.
