Synergy

The Internet and I are still at a standoff - thus far, and no farther will it let me go. I can use my email, watch YouTube, read delicious recipes that make me salivate like crazy . . . all of these are fine. No problem. I could even, I dare say, find many pictures and movies of scantily clad women quite easily. Although that's an assumption I haven't tested.

But uploading a picture? Or an attachment to an email? Nice try. Fat chance. No ****in' way.

So, please have some patience with me. I am considering making an offering to the gods of the internet in order to get the appropriate privileges, but they are capricious gods, and the future still looks uncertain.

In the meantime, I have to talk about synergy. Or serendipity. Or perhaps, confluence. Or maybe all of those things. Let me tell you a story.

Two days ago I was with a student visiting from Russia. It was his first day in New York and he wanted to play basketball (he's huge, about 6'2", and a genius on the court). So we grabbed another student (happened to be from Denmark) and we went to the nearest public court. We all figured they would just go one-on-one.

But that's when the magical synergy or whatever it was from the courts happened. Both of these guys, fresh from the far-flung corners of the world were invited to play ball. Almost immediately. And without much fanfare. The Russian giant played with the regulars of the court (and was pretty evenly matched), and the Danish not-so-much-a-giant was invited to play with two ten-year-old boys. Who almost beat him.

And anyway, sitting on the side of the court watching this, in the intense humidity of an approaching thunderstorm, I was moved. And grateful to be an observer. Glad that at least somewhere, only one thing matters. Can you play ball?