For the most part, I didn't enjoy high school all that much until the last year or so. But I had one moment that was one of the greatest in my life. I think it was probably the Spring semester of my junior year. and it involved a sports moment in gym class. There was a park across the street from my school, and the gym teacher took us there to a concrete softball court. We chose teams, and being skinny and probably not considered athletic, I was chosen near the end to play second base. Actually though, for the last year or two, I practiced catching balls in my basement for hours many days. My basement at the time was roomy and had concrete walls so I would throw a ball against the wall and practice catching them.

Anyway, I am standing near second base, and a kid named Paul Nowak came up to bat. He smashes the ball deep to centerfield, so deep that it hits high off the chain link fence. Now the guy playing centerfield just happened to be Rich Stuart, the varsity shot-putter at my school, probably the guy with the strongest arm in the whole school. I knew a play was going to come my way. So Rich fields the ball off the fence, and throws it directly to me standing next to second base. My only thought was that I was hoping it would come in on a bounce, as that is how I practiced catching most of the time. Sure enough the ball comes in on a short hop to me at second base. I caught the bounce and turned around with the ball in my hand at the exact moment that the batter was arriving at second base and tagged him out. The following moment or two was surreal. I knew I had participated in a great play, but the reaction by everyone on the field was like nothing I have ever seen. For the next minute or two, everyone was stunned and it seemed like time stopped. Even the gym teacher paused for what seemed like a minute before he got the game going again. I was trying to act nonchalant like I did that everyday, but it took a few moments for the game to resume. The only other moment that seemed that surreal involved a girl, but I won't get into that now. :)

So that was my greatest moment in high school, and it involved a sports moment. It was sort of a perfect storm, with a guy hitting a ball off the fence, the centerfielder happening to be a shot putter, throwing a strike to me at second base, and me fielding the throw cleanly and tagging the guy out the second he arrived at the base. Probably not unrelated, the rest of my high school time seemed to be much more enjoyable.