Point of View: A Dribbling Tide?

Had I met Larry Brown at the pickup games the other night, I would, had I not been barred at the gates — “No media,” they said, though, looking about, it seemed I was the sole medium around — have told him that were he to coach here I intended to become the legal guardian of our 10 and 7-year-old basketball-crazed grandsons who live in Perrysburg, Ohio.

The more the merrier, I say. After all, we’ve got a puppy who, in dog terms, will approach their ages in little more than a year. It would enliven the house, whose upstairs, while beautifully appointed now, is unoccupied. And there’s a Ping-Pong table in the basement that’s looking lonely.

Puppies keep you on your toes, and so do grandchildren. It occurs to me, however, that it will be hard to train O’en out of jumping up if Jack and Max, in going for the hoop, which, of course, we’d put outside, are always doing so.

A friend of my daughter’s, one who’s around my age, told Emily during a recent visit to Sewickley, Pa., that her kids reminded her of me at their age, though while I can lay claim to having been as athletic (my mother said I was running at 9 months), they, as I think is the case with all eight of my grandchildren, are smarter. I can do letters, but not numbers, which, of course, is why I was entrusted to do the budget stories for this paper in the past, and why I’m wondering if I’ve counted correctly. A ninth grandchild — I think I have it right — is to arrive in February.

The puppy has already outgrown the crate we had, and in bringing a bigger one upstairs this morning — on loan from a co-worker, Kathleen— I said to Greg, who was helping me, that O’en might be easier to look after in the office than at home — because we hadn’t taught him to read yet. 

Seriously, if Larry Brown becomes East Hampton High’s boys basketball coach, won’t this place become a lodestone for young relations, however distant the bloodline and however far-flung, who love shooting hoops?

The dribbling tide might put a strain on the school systems, but it could well revivify East Hampton’s aging population. It would get the blood flowing again.

Or maybe puppies alone will suffice.