Subject: Weekend Update: The Left-handed Layup - July 4, 2002
Date: Mon, 12 Aug 2002 13:46:52 -0400

A lot has happened so I need to send out separate updates
this week.  Let me tell you about something that happened
on Independence Day that I was not permitted to tell until
today.

As the last of my family was making preparations to leave our
annual family cookout and pool party, David Young asked me to
toss around the basketball.  Lazy as I am, I hemmed a bit but
Joy goaded me into getting out of my chair and onto the court.

David and I tossed a few hoops before he asked if I'd like
to play a game called Horse.  I asked him how and he said that
one person shoots and if he gets the ball in the basket, the other
person has to make the same shot, even if the first person made
the shot while standing on his head.  If the second person misses
his shot, a letter is added until the word "Horse" is spelled at
which time the Horse is the loser and the other player the winner.
If the first person misses the shot, control of the ball goes to
the next person who decides what shot he would like to attempt.
I said, "Sure, why not?" as David set up for his first shot,
when he added, "and if I win, I get to marry Jess."

Here I pause to tell a little family history that David was
well-aware of when he entered into this bargain.  When I asked
Joy's Dad for her hand in marriage, it was after I played him
in several games of chess, and winning handily. 
My father-in-law-to-be was incredulous.  "You beat me so badly
and now you ask me for my daughter's hand in marriage?" I was
young and brash so I quipped, "well, you wouldn't want Joy to
marry a loser, would you?"

I knew that David was going to ask me for Jessica's hand sometime
this summer.  We had joked about him having to move a pile of
rocks as a prerequisite, which he and the Magnuson boys had done
weeks earlier.  (My father-in-law put me on the roof of his house
with a roof repairman I didn't know while he and Millie went to
some church district function for the day.)

The moment had come and I had difficulty holding back my smile
at the intentional parallels.  The whippersnapper has chosen a
game he was likely to beat me in.  I reasoned that it was my
just desserts and so agreed to his terms.  I asked him what
he would do if I won.  He didn't know.  Obviously, he had
only one outcome in mind.  However, he missed his first shot
and passed the ball to me.

I stood at the far corner of the court and lobbed the ball into
the air.  Swish!  He didn't expect that.  It made him a
little nervous and he missed his follow-up shot.  H for David;
firstblood was mine.  However, David's strategy was a good one
because he only needed to relax a bit; I'm not a basketball
player and I could not keep getting shots that he couldn't also
make.

When he got control of the ball, he decided to improve his chances
by calling the next shot as a "left-handed layup".  Off he trotted
and into the basket went the ball.  I lamely dribble the ball with
my left hand and ineptly tossed the ball toward the hoop. It did
hit the rim but failed to go in.  That worried him a little, because
the left-handed layup was his ace in the hole but he tried the shot
again, and I did even worse.  By then I was up to HOR with only two
failures left.  He sensed that he had control of the game.  I complained
bitterly that the left-handed layup was an unfair advantage, but he
was too much more interested in winning the stakes of the game than
giving me an even chance.  He had pity enough to do several other shots
that were effective enough to get me to HORSE. (I wasn't really trying
terribly hard to beat him anyway.)  With the game decided, I said,
"Let's sneak out and go for a drive."  I wanted to have a man-to-man,
heart-to-heart, father-to-probable-son-in-law talk with him before
I gave him my permission.

We crouched low as we ran along the pool fence and up to the house
for my keys.  I hadn't known that my brother John hadn't already
made his exit and was looking for me to say goodbye.  (I couldn't
even tell him why he got snubbed until today!  Sorry John!)  We
jumped into the Eclipse and off we went without telling anybody.

I headed for 7-11 to seal my permission for my daughter's hand with
a Coke Slurpee. I asked David if he had discussed this with Jessica,
which I already knew he had; when he was going to ask me was not known
by anyone, including David. I wanted to hear his perspective on what
he thinks they had discussed.

More importantly, I asked David what made him think that he could wake
up to Jessica every day for the rest of his life.  I didn't mind
putting him on the spot like that with something as important as this.
I told him that Jessica has had a loving relationship modeled for her
all her life, and that she deserves no less!  David's answers to these
and other questions were satisfying, as I expected that they would be,
as we have come to know David and trust Jessica.  We talked about
a number of other things - pressures of young marriage, of the pastoral
call he feels on his life, of decisions and independence - it was my
turn to give "the talk."

We got our Slurpees and I gave David my permission.  On the way
home, I  suggested that I leave him on the side of the road to
walk home, because by then the family had to be wondering where
we had disappeared to, and piecing it together that David finally
had asked me.  I dropped him off just a block or so from the house
and drove into the driveway alone.  I ran inside the house and
shouted, "Do you know what... that... Young man asked me?!"  I
related the story of the "left-handed layup" and they asked,
"Where is David now?"  "I told him to get out of my car and
left him on the side of the road."  David walked in a few minutes
later with a big grin on his face.  (He suggested I come in with a
knife with ketchup on it, but I didn't go that far.)

For much of Jessica's life, "I don't know" have seemed to be
her favorite answer to many questions.  I asked her when we
got to be alone whether she really wanted to marry David, and
there was no shrug of uncertainty but a firm "Yes."  I knew that
I had become the Number 2 man in her life before then but she
confirmed it with her answer, and I am very happy for her!

Now, I caution everyone on the email list that this was only one
step towards engagement.  Technically speaking, they are NOT engaged
until David has formally proposed marriage to Jessica - a popping
of the question event (probably with a ring).  I know that they
have discussed things, and the day is imminent, but we will have
to wait until we hear officially, just as I had to wait for David
to ask me.  I couldn't send this email out until David had spoken
with his parents to let them know that he had asked me.  He wanted
to wait until he saw them face-to-face later this week, but he told
his mom on the phone the other night and they both gave me permission
to tell the story.

Now, if he had only let me choose the game...

Mark

(My regular weekend update journal entry will come out later.)