The first time I dunked

I had been trying for many weeks with a men’s ball, and successfully dunked a smaller than regulation ball that I could palm (one of the pizza hut final four balls) at Shabbona middle school in 1992.

My “Street Ball” was so bald from outdoor use. It was a Christmas present from my father, my first new basketball ever from 4th grade, used for hundreds of games of horse, one/one, and thousands of shots.

It had the skyline of Chicago screen printed on it in white on the blue side, and the words “Street Ball” screened on the orange side in blue ink…I always wondered why the basketball was in Chicago Bears colors.

It was on July 21 1993, that I dunked cleanly (a right hand left footer) for the very first time on a black rimmed Huffy graphite slam-jam hoop in the Ravine Woods apartment complex in Morris, Illinois. It was a warm night and I had gone out with the specific intention to shoot around and try a few dunks…

After the successful execution, I ran in and told my mom and immediately autographed it with a blue Sharpie marker on the orange side and retired the ball. It made the move with me from Ravine woods to the house at 617 E. Washington, but never out of the dusty basement ball bucket it was in. I set that ball free yesterday.

I also found a Wheaties Michael Jordan poster from Dave Depasqua, probably from 1988-1989…he wrote on the back “Dear Pete, The day is coming when you slam and jam like the stars. Keep practicing Pistol Pete. Love, Dave”

Quotes From College Filing Cabinet

So this is what I found:

“The shortest and surest way to live with honor in the world is to be in reality what we appear to be.”
-Socrates

“He who cannot change teh very fabric of his thought will never be able to change reality, and will never, therefore, make any progress.”
-Anwar Sadat

“Character building begins in infancy and ends in death.”
-Eleanor Roosevelt

“It does not take much strength to do things, but it requires great strength to decide on what to do.”
-Elbert Hubbard

“He who labors diligently need never despair; for all things are accomplished by diligence and labor.”
-Menander of Athens

“The best way out is always through.”
-Robert Frost

“The greatest test of courage on earth is to bear defeat without losing heart.”
-Robert Green Ingersoll

“That which we persist in doing becomes easier – not that the nature of the task has changed, but our ability has increased.”
-Emerson

“It is what a min thinks of himself that really determines his fate.”
-Henry David Thoreau

“Positive anything is better than negative nothing.”
-Elbert Hubbard