The Spring of the
Basketball Hoop
This spring is The Spring of the Basketball Hoop. Aaron and
I had talked about it a little bit, in the loose conversation we
have on a walk, or while the boys are tearing around the
park. “We should get a basketball hoop” fell into the same
idle well-intentioned chatter as “we should do something
about the landscaping” and “we should go camping.”
And then one day, when one of our boys was having a
hard day—another hard day after a couple hard weeks:
anxiety and fear, sleeplessness—he and I were in the house,
and when we looked out the front window, we saw Aaron
dragging a basketball hoop down the sidewalk. One of our
neighbors had dragged it to the curb and stuck a “free” sign
on it, and on his way home from work, Aaron grabbed it.
We ran outside, delighted, confused. Did you just steal a
basketball hoop? Our son was very concerned. Aaron
assured him that it was free for the taking. We cleaned it up,
and put up a smaller sized one, too, for littler kids.
And we are just absolutely in love with this beat-up,
hand-me-down basketball hoop and its shorter neighbor
hoop. On hard mornings, it helps our son’s anxious feelings