Thursday, August 2, 2012

DAYDREAMER

Floyd Finding Floyd Inspirational Christian writing 40 Comments

I’d pass the red, white, and blue striped basketball against the house even though my mom and dad told me not to. The house was a frame house and when I’d use it to emulate a pass back to me, it would jar the inside of the house. There were blackish, grey dots all over the wall where I continued to disobey my parents.

I couldn’t help it, I needed a pass to win the make believe basketball game at the buzzer for my team to win. I’d double as not only the star of the game but the announcer as well… I was talented like that… Like every other fourth grader in the world.

I’d toss the patriotic ball hard against the less than solid wall, as the ball was coming back to me, I was transformed. I was suddenly in the Los Angeles Forum, surrounded by thousands and thousands of fans, “Jerry West,” which I miraculously became, “Gets a pass from Chamberlin,” (truly make believe)! “Drives the lane… shoots… It’s good!!!!” – “The Lakers win!!!” HHHHHAAAAAAAA, “The crowd goes wild!!!”

I’d stand about five feet out from the eave of our house and wait for the basketball to roll back down… I was told not to do that too. The basketball was knocking the little asphalted rocks off the roof, leaving little black dots all over the white color coat of the old hot mopped roof.

I’d kick the little rocks off the driveway to try and hide my disobedience, but I wasn’t fooling anyone. My parents knew it, they knew I was dying for a basketball hoop, but it was a rental house and it wasn’t allowed.

I’d run and dribble that ball that I loved up and down that driveway nonstop, pretending to be someone I wasn’t, dreaming of the day I might be as good as my heroes. That day never came… but while I ponder the innocence of youth and appreciate the childhood I had, I cherish the dreams of my youth.

Sure, the dreaming mixed with a lack of wisdom led me down some pretty empty paths, but the process of dreaming, planning, and working toward those dreams I still thoroughly enjoy. I can’t recall the number of times I was called, “a daydreamer,” by my teachers while in school and always with a negative connotation, I was either too dense or too stubborn to be able to change.

God makes each of us unique, special, specific to our calling and gifts. To see things that can or will become reality is prophecy. I’m not saying I’m a prophet, but all of us have dreamed, desired, or had a passion to do something that has become a reality. That dream and the work, along with the perseverance to endure is a gift all unto itself.

I try to make it a point to live my life and beseech the next generation to not only dream, but dream big.

God loves a daydreamer…