I was volunteering my time at a community garden in Hamtramck, when I noticed an older boy juggling a soccer ball all by himself, about 50 yards away from where I was standing. The younger kids who were standing around me noticed the kid too, and one by one made their way over to the boy. Eventually, after a game of keep away, they ended up playing a pick-up game in the empty lot next to the garden.
I spent the better part of my youth playing similar games with whoever was available in my neighborhood. Usually we played baseball, and as fall approached we morphed into games of football. It didn't matter if you were any good or not, what mattered the most was if you had an adequate amount of kids to play whatever the game required. This was how we met other kids in the neighborhood.
School was a different animal, because you had to operate within the boundaries of the adults, and with adults around your options were limited as far as how you could act, but with after-school and summer pick-up games, sky was the limit. We could spit, fight, cuss, and talk trash, without the fear of adults coming around. We were in charge, and this is how we "practiced" being adults. When our Moms would call for dinner, we magically morphed back into the sweet obedient children our Mothers would brag about to their friends and neighbors.
We knew better.
 |
| © tom stoye |
 |
| © tom stoye |
 |
| © tom stoye |
 |
| © tom stoye |
No comments:
Post a Comment