“Holy shit! Do it again!”

I get a little bit red in the face as more people gather around the freak who can swish backwards three-point-shots without breaking a sweat.

“Joe! Come see this!”

Joe leaves the line for pizza, and instead joins the crowd that is now 20 large. The booth operators at the other carnival attractions stare as I draw a larger and larger audience.

“You can’t do it again! There’s no way!” Joe’s friend, a portly little fucker, screams at me — cheeks rosy, plump, and clearly agitated. As his lips suction around the bulb of his waterice cone, I see that he was clearly working up quite an appetite being such a loud and obnoxious prick. So I goaded him on. “Put your money where your mouth is, tubs.”

I take one of the over-inflated balls from the ancient Swiss-cheese net, careful not to spill the remaining balls out into the crowd from one of its many holes. Solidly, I grab the ball with both hands, in a “The T” hand position as if I was shooting normally. Elbows cocked, I turn away from the basket.

“$20.00 says I make it again.”

Two kids throw money down, looking at me in disbelief. “Ain’t no way, shorty!” I was several feet taller than him, but I chuckled at his nickname, knowing he would eat his words in a few short seconds. “No other takers?” I ask.

“Jus sfoot da damd fing!” Joe’s friend had finished the waterice and was now working on an Italian sausage sandwich. I was getting repulsed at the food crumbling from his cherry-chapped lips, and I wanted a new crowd. So, without turning to gauge where I was, I threw up the basketball, shooting it normally — but backwards. I don’t even have to turn around.

Swish!

“HOLY SHIT!” I smile.

“HOWLY SFIT!” Joe’s friend coughs up the large chunk of sausage that had yet to even meet his teeth. “That’s four in a row!” he says with a now-empty mouth. The look on his face was priceless.

I collect the $40.00 and stuff it into my Home Depot carpenter’s-turned-money belt. This routine went on all night — kids talking shit on me, me talking shit on them, me goading them, them losing money. I rarely ever missed this shot. It was an act of God – or of an incredible sense of repetition and muscle-memory.

I was only fourteen myself, an eighth grader at the school that was hosting this “Family Fun Fair.” I would help out my good friend Mr. Z by running the basketball booth until he got there, and I would love doing it. I worked every night to lend a hand, and I collected record amounts of cash for any booth.

Let’s face it. The rules of the booth sucked. You got 3 shots for a dollar. You have to make in THREE out of those three in order to win a fifty-cent prize. Come on now! NBA players can’t even hit that percentage from an uncontested foul line! Regardless, many competitors would blow $15 trying to win that oh-so-cool Dr. Seuss felt hat or the ever popular water-pistol needed to hose down school-girls wearing white-tee-shirts. I don’t blame them. Money well spent.

But as much money as I was bringing into the booth playing the game legitimately, I would bring in even more money by hustling the crowd. What an angelic Catholic I was.

… yet I was a teenager.

I conjure up some more betting suckers, who throw another $40 on the dented red frame that is barely holding up the booth.

Swish!

I take the money. Literally. This time, instead of digging into the Home Depot belt, I dig the cash into the bottom of my too-tight jean pockets.

I did this once or twice a night. I probably stole a hundred to two hundred dollars from my grade school that year. It’s not all a lost cause. 80% of what I stole, I spent that night at the Fair. So the money was being recycled immediately. I know, I know… if Catholicism is the “right religion,” boy will I be red in the face. Hell, here I come — stealing from a Catholic school! Geezus!

Sister Marianna, if you are reading this, please do not bring out the whipping ruler.  I have given hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars in donations to the Church since.