Dribble

The weekend before I took the train to New York on a Sunday in May, I stayed with my good friend Shannon and her family in New Jersey. Shannon and I met at work when she lived in Houston. That was years and years ago. Not only do I adore her and her growing family, but I also adore her parents. They live a couple hours from Shannon in a little town in Pennsylvania in a neighborhood with great big trees that Shannon's father can identify which makes him hold a special spot in my heart since my Father could do the same thing with trees. I don’t always get to see them when I visit Shannon but this time they drove up (over? down?) for the afternoon and dinner on Saturday. In the late afternoon, we were in the driveway putting the children’s toys away for the day when suddenly I found myself in a little game of hoops with him. I lost of course but the thing I want to tell you is that I have never done that before, never played basketball with friends in a driveway, never picked up a ball and tried to toss it in the basket at dusk. And every time that scene unfolded in a book I read or movie I watched, a bit of envy and also disconnect would unfold in me. But not anymore. Shannon and her mother brought out lawn chairs and sat to the edge of the driveway and for a little while, life was nothing more than the camaraderie and play of that little game in the driveway. And that was perfect. Today my friend emailed me a couple photos of that slice of American Pie.