Play Ball! by Mary

Play Ball! by Mary - February 2017 Scholarship Essay

The ball went sailing through the air, right for my face. I was too late to block it as it crushed my glasses up against my nose. For the next moment, all I could smell was blood as I held my face. “That’s the second time this week!” I screamed at the poor, innocent ball-thrower. He hadn’t meant to hit me, not really. He was just goofing off before gym class started, and I’d walked right in the path of the ball he’d bounced off the backboard instead of swishing into the net three feet above our heads. I slammed the ball against the floor, surprisingly satisfied at the resounding noise it made as it slammed down and bounced back up. However, I didn’t see it. I was already marching away.
It wasn’t the only time that same situation occurred. I, the unsuspecting, innocent victim, would be distracted by something equally innocent, only to turn around and come-face-to-face with a ball flying towards my face. I had basketball practice with my church group once a week, and I was shorter than the average girl on the team. I had never made a basket, and I didn’t know all the rules, which was especially frustrating when the referees called me out during our games. After two years, and more basketballs to the face than I can count, I was finished. I told myself I was never going to play basketball again.
Of course, that wasn’t the end. I still remembered what I had learned from basketball after two seasons and several middle school crash courses. There was something about slamming the basketball against an asphalt driveway that made me smile, or at least feel less angry. I had my own ball, and several of my (taller) friends had older siblings and a hoop alongside their driveway. I never made a basket, but I had fun dribbling and keeping the ball away from the other players.
Then my lung collapsed. I sat down after singing choir and my lung exploded with pain. It happened two more times over the span of six months, and the doctor put his foot down. If I wanted to stay out of the hospital, I would need to exercise more. That’s when my mom pulled out a flyer for the latest season of church basketball. She’d played basketball. My extremely tall aunts all played basketball. My friends all played basketball. My mom took this as a sign that I needed to get back in the game too. So Wednesday evening at six o’clock, I showed up to the church gym, wearing gym shorts in the middle of winter.
The new coach pushed us hard, harder than I remembered ever practicing. Our division’s team had gone undefeated in the past two years-- they’d won every game, and even though the tournament was set up to have fun and meet new people, none of us wanted to break that streak. Including, I found out, me. Now I was the oldest on the team, but the best two girls were right behind me in age. They picked up the slack for the rest of us, but that didn’t mean we didn’t try.
Our first two games were won by landslides, and in the second half of the third game, it happened. I’d dribbled down the court, but no one was open. No one but the basket. I tossed the ball into the air, futilely hoping one of my teammates would get the rebound and we could start again. As it turned out, I didn’t need hope, because the ball sailed neatly into the basket with a swish that sounded better than any dribble. Everyone who saw the shot congratulated me at the end of the game, and I was still in disbelief, telling them that they should have taken a picture, because it was highly unlikely that I’d ever make another basket during the entirety of my basketball career, however long that lasted. Two weeks later, I made two more baskets, winning four more points for my team in our final game of the season. Once again, we were undefeated.
It is hard to play basketball. I still got hit in the face, and games were definitely more fun than practicing drills that felt completely pointless. But it paid off. Without constant practice at layups and jump shots, I never would have made the baskets that gave me such a confidence boost. I still prefer a good book to playing a ball game, but I have found that sports can still be fun, even if you get hurt.