THINGS I WAS GOOD AT

God gives all of us some talent.  Sometimes he gets carried away and gives one person way too much such as a good looking individual who can sing, dance and is a 4.0 student.  But mostly he spreads talent around.  Often times we go years without knowing what our particular ability is but sooner or later it will surface.  In my case there were 3 things I did well quite early in life.  Not particularly what one might be proud of when remembering things you do well but you take what you can get. 

At the time I was a young boy cities were designed with a main street and then parallel streets forming blocks.  Each block had its own group of kids that generally ran around together and became close friends.  We lived on Marconi Street.  That was our block.  We had the usual assortment of weirdo’s, nerds, kids who liked to play and stud athletes. 

Most of the time kids played with those on their own block.  Once in a while those from one block would issue a challenge to one or more of the others.  It could be in one of the ball sports, foot races and relays, bike riding, roller skating or even marbles.  The one being challenged got to decide where the throw-down would take place.  Invariably, it was played out on their home turf.   

During this time I learned I was pretty good at 3 things.  One was running backwards.  Even though each block had its own football team it wasn’t until you took the best players from each block to form the cities flag football teams that you found out who the real men were (if you can call 11-12 year olds men). 

At these team practices we were coached by guys that knew what they were doing.  Thus we had to run certain drills that were designed to find out what we were good at and then make us better. 

When our team was on defense I would play defensive back.  One of the main tasks for a defensive back is to cover the other team’s receivers, which means you must run backwards as fast as they are running forward to stay with them.  So our coaches had us run sprints backwards to determine which among us had the speed to play the position.  I was unbeatable.  Even though I had close to glacial speed going forward I was a burner going backwards.  Guys that could run off and leave me were eating my dust in these sprints.  Talent number one.

Talent number two was bike riding.  I had a red, decked-out Schwinn that fit my style.  I could make that bike do everything but talk.  If I had fallen asleep on it I don’t think it would have tipped over.  Word spread that I was pretty fast.  Then the challenges came. 

All the kids would meet at the end of one block.  We would line up across the street, someone would drop their arm signaling the start and we would race off to the finish line near the other end of the block.  I could not be beaten.  But the strange thing was, I could trade bikes with any of the guys and I would still win.  No matter whose bike I rode or who rode mine, I would always win.  Pretty cool, huh.

My third talent was Dodge Ball.  I was a off-the-charts good at this.  Most often we played during recess at school.  A whole bunch of kids, both boys and girls, would get in the middle of a circle.  Outside the circle a couple of kids would try to hit one of us with a rubber ball.  If you were hit by the ball you had to leave the circle and join those on the outside.  The last one left in the circle was the winner.  There may have been a time or two when I was not the last one but I can’t remember when.  At that age girls were more advanced than guys so once in a while some smarty pants girl would be going against me at the end but to no avail.

I had a move where I would run full speed, stop on a dime and at the same time throw my hips backwards, making my body in the shape of a U.  The ball would go whizzing by in the middle of the U.  This move served me well at crunch time when there were only a few of us left in the middle of the circle.   

So when God passed out talent he did not miss me.  Granted it’s kind of weird but at least I was good at something.