My lone dunk

When I was in my late teens, a bunch of us decided to play a game of pickup basketball at the old elementary school. The basket was a few inches short of a regulation 10 feet.

I was playing on a team with a guy named Ricky. He'd played varsity basketball and was easily the best player on this team. He also was well-known for shooting finger rolls.

When he drove to the basket, for some reason, I followed. He did his finger roll, and the ball went DING! off the front of the rim. For a fraction of a second, it hung in front of the basket.

I swooped in, grabbed the ball with two hands and slammed it gently. It was my only dunk in a game, ever. (I did, however, dunk playing HORSE or just fooling around, but that's a different story.)

No one seemed impressed with the dunk; I don't know if anyone ever mentioned it. It was impressive to me, though; I was six feet tall and about 280 pounds, after all.

 I remember it, nearly 50 years later. Boy, it felt good.

EMAIL: tgilli52@gmail.com  TWITTER: EDITORatWORK

More blog entries by Tom Gillispie

• Resume for a writer and editor

• An editor's views on powerful writing

• Advice for be and would-be novelists

• Links to TG's stories online

• Favorite quotes

• What I do when I'm editing

Anecdotes by Tom Gillispie

• Wipeout at Death Valley

• Days with rainbows

• A desperate writer working in the dark

• Yer outta there!

EDITOR@WORK blog entries

• You really DO need an editor

• Reminders for would-be novelists

• What I do when I'm editing

• What I charge (it's a deal) and what I edit

• Slogging through the Internet

• J-school: More eyes on your stories

• J-school: Go out and learn

• Rookie mistakes for magazine writers

Entries from The Dog Blog

• Katie cried

• Growl and pull

• 13-plus years with my dog Lady

• ... said the spider to ...

• The Dog Diary (2014)

• YIP! YIP! The stereo-sound huskies

• What Lady and Michael Jackson had in common

Blog entries from The Auto Racing Journal

• Angel in Black: Remembering Dale Earnhardt Sr.

(a book of great stories about the Intimidator)

• Then Junior Said to Jeff...

(the book of great NASCAR stories)

• My best day as a sports writer

• Jeff Gordon's milk toast to Dale Earnhardt

• Wayne Auton: A life in racing