by Zador Spanish schools Spain
- My Mom packing my lunch in the grey and blue cooler that I still have. She always put an icepack in their to keep things cool. There was always a Gatorade (orange). A sandwich of some sort. Usually an apple as well. And my name was on the cooler on masking taping - "C. Stevenson"
- It was HOT! We did a good bit of practicing outside on the blacktop. Drills mostly, but games as well.
- I got pick on a bit, and one time really still is fairly vivid in my memory. I had on an Adidas shirt, and this was during their “All Day I Dream About Sports” ad campaign. Well one kid who I guess didn’t like me turned the “Sports” into “S**” and said I liked that. Now for an 8 year old boy, that was a bit disturbing. He, I guess, expected me to get really upset about it. But I played it cool, only replying “So?”. But it still bothers me and I remember how scared I was at the time.
- The head coach had a really really shiny bald head. I mean SHINY!
- The rebounding and shooting contraption. They had this device that you set up around a basket, it had netting on it that forced you to shoot with a minimum amount of arc (a good idea), and it also had three ball return chutes the get you the ball (also cool). It was giant to a small guy like me, but I loved that thing. I could shot 3’s all day by myself.
- I remember how excited I always was for lunch. Maybe my most favorite part of the day.
- 4-square! We played that a lot, I think during lunch. That was a fun game. Had to use the big red bouncy balls (also a must for kickball), and there were all these weird rules about special bounces you could earn and use. I didn’t get that part of the game. Evidently one of them was where you could grab the ball and two handed slam it in someone’s square. I hated that.
- The basketball coach also had really short shorts, the old school coach lycra material one’s. Awesome.
- I was always extremely excited to see my Mom when she picked me up.
I loved that camp, it was a lot of fun and I truly learned a lot about basketball. Up until a certain age (I think 12 or 13) I tended to be one of the top 2 or 3 kids in my age group. I was an all-star. Something happened when I was 12 or 13, I think I moved up an age bracket. But I was on a new team where all the kids new each other and were “cool”. I felt like an outsider and a dork. I went from a whirling dervish scorer, to a pass only point guard.