hoop dreams and the cracked asphalt of nostalgia

So yesterday evening I headed up to Rucker Park (Adam was photographing the event for the Knicks so I thought I'd go say hi)for an Entertainment Ball Classic. So good. Amazing finally getting to go there, having heard about it for so long, being such a legendary place. Hilarious commentators. The game was pretty good as well and it was a lovely summer evening, weather-wise.

And then on Wednesday night I played basketball again for the first time in years. Our apt being on the 21st floor, I can see the bball court (well, tennis court with hoops at either end) that’s behind Duane Reade from the front room, and when I got home it was empty so I grabbed the ball and headed down. The ball is one I found in the apt. when we moved in, it’d been left by the previous tenants. I dunno who they were but this ball is half flat and has some wack Scooby-frickin-doo flowery print all over it

Note to self: get a new basketball asap

Anyway, so I get down to the tennis-bball court. The net is still up for tennis. It's on like a jetty or pier out into the river, so I'm playing bball with the Hudson lapping around me and if I turn around (I was playing at the end of the court opposite from the entrance) then I can see the whole of the Manhattan skyline, solemnly sitting there under slightly glowering cloud formations.

Despite having not played for years, the first three shots went straight in. False confidence though as after that I wasn’t so good, averaging... well, below 50% I guess. I was just messing around, shooting 'n stuff. I was annoyed that I couldn't get it from the free throw line. About eight and a half, nine feet from the baseline i was fine. Nothing but net. For real. But that extra step back to behind the line... and it all went pete tong. Half the time I was just throwing up air balls. Shoddy performance. (Didn't even bother with the three-pt line, never been able to shoot treys. Weak underformed girlish arm muscles don't allow for that...)

But how strange it was to play on a smooth, level playing surface. Where's the cracked asphalt? The loose gravel? The kids on bikes short-cutting through the playground, the dogs chasing sticks, the skaters heading over to the half pipe? Why isn't the court split in half between the streetball players, with their trash talk and shouting and skins-v-shirts, and the kids messing around at the other half? Where's that occasional smell, that twitch of the nostrils as someone lights up a joint as it gets darker? Where's r's moped that looked like he'd jacked it from a pizza-delivery guy that was always parked nearby? Where's Picnic, so nicknamed by us because he always seemed a few sandwiches short of a picnic? Or Jason, or Leon, or the boy who wore the Boss shirt? Where's Frankie, aka Dred? (Not that I actually have any desire ever to see him again, ever, mind you) Where are the streetlamps flicking on, the back end of the old hospital looming over the park, the roars of motorbikes and cars coming from Goldhawk Road? Ahh Ravenscourt Park and your crummy basketball court, site of my misspent youth, I do have occasional pangs of nostalgia for thee...