What hobbies have been passed down from your family?

If this essay is boring, you can blame it on my parents. They were inconsiderate. Some people do skydiving or axe-throwing, but all I got was basketball. My dad has played basketball his entire life. He played for a season in college and for my whole life he has played at the YMCA or at the park. While we don’t play together much anymore, we have probably played a thousand games together over my lifetime.

There is a picture of me in our family photo album. I am in the playroom of our old house and I am shooting a little rubber basketball into a three-foot plastic hoop. According to my parents, I was about one in the photo, and I had just started playing basketball.

There is another photo, this one from my grandparents house in New York. I am 3 years old holding a basketball and wearing a green jersey and matching shorts. By this point, I was completely obsessed. I read basketball books, I watched basketball on TV, and I wore exclusively basketball clothes. Whenever we went on vacation, finding a basketball hoop was my number one priority. If our destination didn’t have a hoop, I would improvise. I have a vague memory of going to the crayola factory and getting scolded for grabbing handfuls of crayons, walking away, and trying to toss them back into the bins from afar.

I remember hitting my first shot on a 10ft hoop, I can recall highlights and lowlights of games going back 10 years, I remember going to my first NBA game, I remember having basketball birthday parties at the YMCA, I remember father-son basketball camp, and I have so many memories of playing at the park with friends.

I started out playing YMCA and park district basketball. These teams were full of my friends and often coached by my dad. Around fourth grade, I played on my first AAU team, which practiced at the U of I facility and was occasionally visited by the U of I coach. I missed the beginning of my fourth grade season with a broken finger (I broke it at practice the day before our first game). In sixth grade, after breaking another finger the summer prior, I joined another AAU team (while still playing on the first one, simultaneously). For both teams we played in tournaments in Bloomington, Chicago, and St. Louis. I have great memories of staying in hotels and going to Buffalo Wild Wings after games.

Since seventh grade, I have played for my school team every year. My subbie season started off well, but I missed most of the season with a concussion and a broken finger. Freshman year was uneventful and Sophomore year was just practices and scrimmage. I can’t wait for this season – I think we have the potential to be really good.

I have so many more basketball memories: Putting bags over my ball to improve my ball-handling, writing plays for 3 on 3 tournaments, and spending hours reading about basketball shoes. I still watch NBA youtube videos and play 2K. I have three nerf hoops in my room and most days after school I shoot around at the park.

Certainly part of the reason I love basketball is my dad, but I don’t feel like I was forced into it. I’ve played football, soccer, and baseball as well, but basketball is what stuck. I also play tennis, but my life is pretty boring so I’ll stretch that into another essay.

One would think that after playing for so long I would be good at basketball. One would think. Despite likely not playing in college, I don’t regret any of the time I have spent playing basketball. It has provided friends, exercise, and competition. But most importantly, I love to play. I would revise this essay more, but I have to get some shots up before my CS quiz.