From the Jan 11 – Jan 17, 2001 issue

Columns

Rick Levin Courtside

by Rick Levin

In 1982, my family moved from Federal Way, Washington, to Burnsville, Minnesota. For us, this was business as usual: Dad was simply following the eastward trajectory of his up-climbing career in the retail food industry--a career that now landed him, his wife, and three hyperactive sons just 20 miles south of downtown Minneapolis, in a bigger house in a more prosperous suburb. My brothers and I weren't happy about the move at first (no friends, new school), though it did have its immediate benefits. For example, we now possessed a gigantic basement. Of course, this basement was entirely functional, meant to protect our family from summer tornadoes, but for me it was something more than mere shelter. It was a space of infinite potential. And I couldn't have been more delighted when, one weekend, my father brought home a brand new Ping-Pong table and set it up right in the middle of that wonderful concrete bunker.Just about every night for three years running, it was the same thing; the routine never changed. Wherever I was, no matter what I was doing, Dad would give the signal--a grunt, a nod, perhaps a wink--and within five minutes we would both be down in the basement, poised over the net, gripping paddles. The bare bulb in the ceiling threw a harsh halo of light upon the flat green surface. My father, a lit cigarette dangling lazily from his mouth and his chicken legs sticking out from under a plaid bathrobe, would smack the ball across the table. "Volley for serve," he'd say.

Dad was a crackerjack competitor. He'd go easy at first, toying with me, letting me get involved in the game, boosting me up. Then he'd start to tighten the screws. With a continuous stream of chatter and taunts, my father would ineluctably chip away at my concentration. Smiling, he'd tell me exactly where he was going to put his next shot, and then he'd put it there, and I would violently overcompensate and send the ball shooting against a wall. Or he would send sitting-duck lobs floating over the net, challenging me to slam them back as hard as I could, and I'd swing and miss. This always made him laugh. I didn't think it was funny at all. I'd grow furious. And the more furious I grew--the harder I tried--the more effortless became Dad's game. It didn't matter that I had superior timing and coordination, or that I was so much younger. Pop had my number. He could so utterly unravel me that my actions transformed into an involuted comedy of self-sabotage. Most of the time, all my dad had to do was hold the paddle in front of his face to avoid getting beaned by my wild return shots.

The day I finally beat Dad at Ping-Pong was the day I learned to ignore everything but the immediate physical reality of his game, and mine. There was nothing left to lose. I'd run out of excuses. Sick of wallowing in my own frustration, I decided to completely shut out the atmosphere of hype enveloping my dad's game, to close myself off to everything that did not directly involve getting the ball back to his end of the table. I focused. I started responding with a distracted "Uh huh" to his verbal taunts. I laughed whenever he laughed. Suddenly, things started going my way. My swings grew easier, more confident. I wasn't exactly invincible, but I was certainly less vulnerable. I began winning with some regularity. More importantly, though, playing became fun. Scores were incidental. And I can't imagine there's a sport in the world where this isn't the case.

rick@thestranger.com