“Do you play basketball?” If I had a penny for every time I heard this question, I am guessing I would have at least fourteen dollars. I am was just doing some quick math here, my guess is that I heard this at least seventy times a year in the last twenty years. When talking to other tall people, especially tall men, I am glad I at least played basketball, because I bet this question gets even more annoying/obnoxious if you never did. Plus, let’s face it, if you are as tall as I am and never played basketball, chances are you hate basketball, making this question even more annoying.
I started writing this January first (it turns out that writing a blog while parenting is not that easy…). The end of the year is a time of reflection for most, and it always takes me down memory lane. Major life events probably help with the whole “taking stock of your life” shtick, and having my second child in November probably helped getting me in reflection mode. Lil’ guy is definitely my child, the first measuring put him on the 92nd percentile for length, 40th percentile for weight (granted I am a little heavier these days), and 29th percentile for head size.
As usual, I am digressing. End of the year, reflection…how does this relate to being tall again? Oh yeah “Do you play basketball?” Okay, last quick digression. I STILL get this question in the present tense. Not “did you play basketball?” But “do you play basketball?” I am 38 years old, live in a town with no professional basketball team (I did a quick search just to make sure there were no weird pro basketball teams around), and I still get the question. I mean, the correct answer is I do play basketball, with a bunch of dudes at work. I don’t think that’s what people want to hear about. In all honesty though, what exactly people expect to get from my answer to the question “do you play basketball?” Okay, rant over.
The question “do you play basketball” is an interesting one to me when I start reflecting on my life. I am now fifteen years removed from my small college ball days, and nine years removed from my last stint in competitive basketball in Brazil. But, basketball was my life, and is the sole reason how I got to where I am, why I now live where I live (the tundra) and do what I do. Reflecting on basketball, tallness, and my life always makes me wonder what I would be doing if I had given up basketball when I my coach kicked me out of the team when I was fifteen for not taking it seriously (I came back begging to be able to rejoin the team), or if I really quit basketball at seventeen a year after my first attempt at playing at a higher level did not go as well as intended (I didn’t, but not for lack of trying).
Fifteen years ago I think I imagined alternative scenarios more vividly than today. Now, I am damn near forty, with a wife and two kids and a pretty good life, so it becomes harder, almost impossible, to imagine a different life. All the mistakes made in youth, all the decisions that led me to be where I am today, all the people who helped me along the way, all this led to this reasonably kick-ass life, so thinking of alternative universes is harder, but taking stock on what happened with gratitude is easier.
When reflecting, one thing is clear, “do you play basketball” is a part of who I am, no matter how far back the actual playing happened. But I wonder if being tall led me to where I am today, maybe more than playing basketball. Well, that’s a tough chicken-egg-ish situation. I played basketball because I was tall, and I think I got good enough at basketball to take advantage of opportunities that came from it because at age eighteen I was 6’8″ with a 7’3″ wingspan.
When I was fifteen I lived in Goiania, Brazil, a “small town” of 1.5 million people. I was a regular kid from a lower middle class family that like many others during that time in Brazil struggled to pay the bills. My parents worked hard to allow me to do at least three things: go to a private high-school, play club basketball and take English classes. I was a good student. This was the equivalent of my junior year in high-school. I got good grades and was on the path to take the vestibular (the ridiculously hard entrance exam to prestigious universities in Brazil). I had no idea what I wanted to study in college, but I liked our two high school biology teachers, so I thought about being a Biology major. Sounded like a good path: the exams weren’t as competitive but I could still get a decent job. I was a poor kid in a classroom full of rich people. I was also the darkest student in my class. Poor, black, and quiet, I mostly kept to myself. Being tall was not a part of my identity yet, I was 6’1″, tall enough not to be messed with but weird looking enough not to be able to hang out with the popular kids.
I liked my English classes more than I liked basketball. I was good at English, the language came easier than ball-handling. The only things fun about basketball were hanging out with some cool dudes (I can’t remember one single friend from high school, but I still am friends with many of my teammates I met in the mid-90s) and oogling at hot chicks at the club we practiced (I was fifteen, so I am not sure there was any escaping in that). I had my routine: go to school, go home, have lunch, go to English classes, then go to the club to practice. At fifteen, this seemed good enough.
I was not good at basketball, but I also did not try hard enough. I was happy with being the second to last coming from the bench. That year the club hired a new coach. Pretty quickly everyone realized this guy meant business, but I didn’t. Finally, one day, when I was messing around in practice, he kicked me out of practice and off the team. At first I was kinda relieved, thinking I was in the right for being upset at this old guy calling me out on my laziness. It took me one week to realize was felt incomplete, empty, without basketball. At age fifteen, going to a high school where I felt I didn’t belong, I did not realize that basketball was one of the few escapes I had. So, a week later, I went back “with my tail between my legs” (Brazilian expression, here is a list of translations) asking to get back on the team. Looking back, it was probably the most consequential decision I made in my life.
Making a very long story short, that year I grew almost four inches. Growing came after I started taking basketball more seriously, so it also meant that my height came with newfound drive and assertiveness. I was getting better and I could feel the difference. That year we beat some great teams, I played in the national collegiate games and made a small name for myself. The next year, I moved 500 miles away from home (at age 16 by myself, what were my parents thinking???) to play basketball in the country’s most competitive junior league. Two years later I moved to Rio and played there for two years, before coming to the United States to play small college ball on scholarship. By the time I arrived in the United States at age 19, I have lived on my own for three years, and have become more independent and confident on my ability to be a functioning adult. In college, my teammates became lifelong friends. More importantly, I would have never been able to move to the United States and figure what I really wanted to do with my life if it wasn’t for basketball.
None of this would happen if I had not been kicked out of my basketball team at age 15. None of this would happen if I had not returned and taken it seriously. I played basketball before “do you play basketball?” was something that people asked me. Back then, I didn’t realize how much of my identity basketball was. Today, even when I get annoyed at a stranger asking me a confusingly unnecessary question, I take in stride. Because deep down I know that while the person is asking a mundane question, it is a question that is more complex, and more life-changing, than I can ever explain to the rando guy who is probably jealous of my height.
Big People, Little World 