My Basketball - Don't Even Think about It

Tom said he was going to write his name on the basketball with a sharpie marker. He didn't want to get mixed up in a who-owns-this-basketball fracas with the kids who always play on the half court on our street in Chelsea. We had just been talking about going down there to shoot some hoops.

Good idea about the name on the basketball, I said, except it's my name that is going to get written on the basketball. Because it's my damn basketball.

Tom disagreed. He said he was sure it was his basketball. And anyway, it had been pretty flat and he used his bicycle pump and pumped it up again.

I said I know it is my basketball because I got it at the office Evil Santa gift exchange. I stole that basketball fair and square. I said there were probably a dozen witnesses and they weren't that drunk. They would remember whose basketball we were looking at here.

I probably threw in a small fingerwag at this point because I even knew who brought the wrapped basketball to the party in the first place. He originally bought it for a disabled five year old, but then realized you can't give a little kid a full-sized basketball. That would be suboptimal. Five year olds have tiny hands and soft skulls.


The next day at the office, everyone agreed I should just put my initials on the basketball. That would be cooler than writing my whole name.