HE KEEPS DISHING-----

AND THE GUYS KEEP SWISHING!!!

By now if you are reading any of this blog you know that I am a poet.  Well, I  just heard  a great line of verse on  GET UP and GO on ESPN   that sort of sums up the  impossible made possible victory in OVERTIME of the Cavs over the Raptors.  And yes, there were  other players from Cleveland there  --not just LEBRON.  No, He cannot do that three more times and live, but they can keep helping and  
dunkin' those 3s and they will win three more  and go on to take the EAST.

After the game I was so exhausted--I felt like I was there and clutching that ball like Kevin Love, hugging the ball and  whirling and hitting  any one  who came near me  with my elbows.  It was like looking at  myself in a playground. WHAT PLAYGROUND??  NOVELTY PARK.

YES, NOVELTY PARK--__Does anyone remember  that place that is at the point where Brewster Street  t's into Division Street and is now  the site of some poorly kept apartments????The same corner where on the right there is still a bar that was  once the notorious FORD's??

Novelty Park had a summer program.  I know because that is where  some nice summer  counselor taught me to make my first  gimp bracelet --and  WAIT FOR IT --- NOVELTY PARK had a swimming pool. I am not dreaming it.  There is nothing there.  YOU must drive completely around the  block now  to find the pathetic  remnant of something like a little  play area on  what was once the backside of Novelty Park.
What else did Novelty Park HAVE?

 I may not be  recalling  everything and I do beg that if anyone who is reading this   can recall more or  less, please do tell me. 

I recall a building  It was a Vets Post of some kind.  When It rained  we could  rush into the building and take in the craft supplies so they did not all get wet.
There was a swing set and we could go very high and jump off. There was a slide
It had a metal circular  ride we called a roundabout  that  you stood or sat on  or and ran along side and then jumped on to get a  ride.  Big boys tormented --or thrilled-- little girls  by  running beside the  ride and  pushing so hard that it went at  unimaginable speed. AND that is my testimony. WE SCREAMED A LOT !!! 

Then going back to the  road that runs Parallel to Division there was a softball playing area.  AND since I seldom walked that way there must have been a gate.  That is where the crummy playground remnants are now.  I have driven by and have never seen anyone there.

Next to the Park on the  right on Division  Street there was a large and to my tenement -bred eyes a quite impressive white house.  Best of all there were a few Pear trees in the yard  and they  produced really juicy and sweet pears.  The large yard had an imposing fence--but when I was  eight years old  high fences weer no barrier.  I would climb over and  get pears and bring them back for all my friends. 
  Sometimes the  woman who lived there would come out and shout at me.  But she never did anything more and often in my rush I had just taken fallen pears. NO TREE DAMAGE.
When I read Saint  Augustine's Confessions in college, I  laughed and marveled at how he reported that he had stolen pears as a child.
My goodness if I confessed sins like stealing pears, I would have never  left the confessional.
I guess I am finally coming clean here,

I could do a whole  blog post complete with map of the best Pear trees to rob in my neighborhood.
Well,  I will save that  until after the CAVS  or the CELTICS take the EAST.