Today, a Monday; was a real Lazy one. Workplace was practically dead and everything was happening equally slow. Like a sudden shower in mid summer, my boss tosses in the most unusual words to be spoken on a Monday, "you may leave early today, if you wish to". I contain my excitement, finish the remainder of the work and pack up for the day.
As I ride home, I keep thinking of what all should I be doing with this extra time on hand, without knowing what exactly should I do. In the mean time, I come to a halt at a particular traffic signal,- my usual way home and by default I look to the left where one of my city's oldest Basketball Court lay. Each day as I pass through the same route, I see many people playing and every single day by heart pounds saying 'wish I was there'. Firstly, blame it on my injured knee and secondly my new busy schedule had kept me off the game. But today, the court was empty. And I decide without a second thought, ''let me grab my kicks and the ball to get back to basics''.
In the next 30 mins, I'm on the court with energy levels at an all time high. Like usual, I keep shooting randomly, laying a few shots; to warm myself up. Post surgery and through the ongoing rehab, I did hit the court a couple of times, purely based on the acquired skill, experience and confidence of the past, but never for a proper session of practicing or learning new moves. Today, I consciously decided and tell myself, "from today, I shall get back to the basics one step at a time and again reach out to the top". Having said that to myself, I start doing very basic ball handling drills. Being a baller who's game is definitely not holding the ball for a considerable period of time, I do real good on those first set of drills. With a feeling of accomplishment, I move to the next level of drills and it's here that I had seen where I actually stand. The moves that I had previously done with lightening speed, is now at a snail's pace. Reflexes have gone from quick to blank. Like these, one after the other I tend to pick up all of my negatives and these kept bottling up my head, ready to erupt and it did. Yes, I was trying a set of moves whose objective is switching the hands over the ball and I fail. Result- I kick the ball into nowhere.
And then, I pause staring into oblivion. I have just done something which I had never ever done earlier. Right from the days that I was taught playing ball, was always told and I did it sincerely- to respect your fellow player, the court and the equipment. I had just broken the strong principle that shaped me up as a formidable athlete through the years. There I was at rock bottom, filled with frustration. I take a deep breath and like a ray of light in pitch darkness, I recollected the other principle which I had not really put into practice after the injury- 'Fitness is a journey, not a destination and acquired skill will always be there, but will need regular tune ups.
I take a break and walk over the court in contemplation. ''I WAS quick, I WAS Strong, I JUMPED high, I ENDURED long hours of play''; whatever I figured out, was only in the past tense and nothing in the present. And then one and only one thing that was always part of me as a whole, enlightened me- my Stubbornness. It was only this quality of mine that took me miles ahead of others both on and off the court. ''This is it'', I commanded my self and quickly grabbed the ball and almost instantly I recollect a very valuable shooting tip my senior gave me in the morning. I start firing one after the other- 3's, inside the paint, off the board and I miss most of them. "What's that stopping me from scoring a basket?", I ask myself and keep on firing, tweaking my technique step by step, this time I do make a few but not as clean as supposed to be. Now, I say one Thing* to myself after which, I hear only one thing- Swoosh, Swoosh, and Swoosh. As this rhythm is going on and on for quite sometime, I am interrupted by two acquaintances as they walk in and ask for a game of 21 and we start playing without any delay. The quicker dude get's past me more than thrice (which again in the PAST, a playmaker would have to sweat out a pool to get past me, leave alone scoring a basket) and I say yet another Thing* to myself after which, he does goes past me like usual but at the end of which I'm left with the ball turned over by him.
What's the Thing* that kept me rolling? Even after I return home and analyze the- Thing*, I feel that it holds good for anyone to play a good game of basketball; and I put it like this-
"While on the Offensive, let there be NOTHING between YOU and the hoop,
While on the Defensive, YOU are EVERYTHING between him and the hoop".
-Kamal
p.s. On a literal note, I hope this was never said by anyone and I did not even dare try to search the web for similar quotes. I choose to leave the comparisons to my fellow baller's who read this and I shall end this by thinking that even if it does match with some one had said earlier; well, there goes the popular phrase "like minds think alike".
