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Hunker Down with Kes

Precious Memories, How They Linger...

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The girls’ basketball team from my little hometown just won the state championship. I was thrilled. Once a McKenzie High School Rebel, always a McKen...

Before I could even start to celebrate, Emily Scarbrough came smiling into my mind.

Emily was the first girl ever to tell me that we should get married. She was eight at the time. I was a year older. She had a specific motive for the union. And it had nothing to do with the traditional thought process behind a man and a woman taking up housekeeping together.

Emily was the best sports girl person that I’ve ever known. Bar none!

The day she brought up our marital possibilities we were looking for a baseball John Ingram had hit into the high grass behind Barbara Scates’ side yard. The whole game had stopped. It was the only ball we had!

Emily’s hair was plastered to her face. Sweat dripped off the rounded point of her chin. Dirt rings were forming at the edge of her neck. Her eyes were in a dither as they darted to and fro, searching frantically for the lost horsehide. You’d think maybe not the best “picture” to present when bringing up a marriage proposal.

But it really wasn’t, my hair was just as plastered. Sweat also streamed across my cheeks, soaking the dirt rings below. That was trifling stuff...

Could you run down a deep fly to left center was way more important than how you looked. A hook slide into second to beat an “on the money” throw didn’t care a whit about dirt rings.

I’m looking like a madman for the lost ball. I didn’t come over here to wade through the weeds!

“We’ve got to find it,” Emily was thinking along those same lines. “We’re wasting game time!”

You understand the reason for the proposal. It was two peas in a pod. She’d have an all-time friend to help keep the game going.

The first time in my life that I realized grownups were not as smart as they looked was when they wouldn’t let Emily play Little League Baseball with us...because she was a girl. It made no sense then, or now! We only had four teams. We needed every player we could get.

And believe me, Emily Scarbrough was a player!

When they built those two tennis courts behind the high school gym Emmer and I went to playing tennis. It didn’t matter that we’d never played before. It was a sport and we got “after it.” 95 percent of all the tennis I’ve ever played in my life was against her!

The builders of the courts had thoughtfully put up basketball goals on the side nearest the gym. Boy howdy, did Emmer and I give those chain nets a workout! When others showed up we’d choose up sides and play “full court”

When everyone else left, Em and I would play “one-on-one” till dark-thirty. I was a little taller and heavier. She was quicker and more athletic. Neither would give an inch. I’d kinda lean on her to move her out of the way; she’d “accidentally” step on my foot and elbow me (not so accidentally) in the ribs as she maneuvered around me for an easy layup.

On those 38 degree days, with puffs of snow falling, during Christmas break we’d have the court all to ourselves. Sane folks were home watching “As the World Turns.” Me and Em were playing for the championship of the known world!

I didn’t marry Emily Scarbrough. But I seriously thought about it when I was 15 for the same reason she’d brought it up years before.

Emmer was a freshman the last time the McKenzie girls were in the state basketball playoffs. The year was ’63. And she made some valuable contributions to that team as a ninth grader. Her final 3 years she collected conference, district and regional awards like she was picking up rocks down by Archie Moore’s pond and knocking them out into the water with a cut off broom handle.

I will say again, she was the best I ever saw!

Emily Scarbrough died when she was 52. Cancer. I had not seen her in years. But let me tell you, I know with all my heart she fought that wretched disease with the same grit and determination she went after a loose ball heading out of bounds.

I congratulate the McKenzie Rebels as the newly crowned state basketball champions. You have made us all proud! And ladies, you don’t realize it, but you’ve also brought a smile to a very special angel that once wore the Red and Gray.

Did I tell you, she was a real player...

Respectfully,
Kes