I am gifted with great parents. They tell me everything. Nothing is too hard for me to understand. They did this even when I was younger. I'd ask a question like "Mummy, who's your boss?", and she would answer: "Marilyn. Remember, you saw her last Friday", and I would ask "Who's her boss?". She would answer, and I would ask the same question again till we reached the President of the United States. "And, who's HIS boss?" And she would say: "Well, Katya, he doesn't really have a boss, he actually works for all of us". That stumped me when I heard it, and I remember asking her how he could be our boss and still work for us. And she would explain how our political system worked. And that was when I was 5yrs old! I didn't understand all of that when she explained it to me, but as I got older, I did. My parents never told me I was too young to understand something they did.
My mom suprised me last night. Normally when I ask her questions,
she gives me the answers right away. Once in a while, more so lately,
she would tell me she didn't know, and that she'd find out and let me know.
She always would. Like the time I asked her about Einstein.
"Mom, who's Einstein, and why did he say 'E=Mc2'
?"
"My, my, Katya, where did you hear that?"
"I saw it on Hal's T-shirt." (Hal was our enlightened gardener)
"Einstein was a famous scientist, and the formula states a relationship
between the mass of something and how much energy it has. The more
mass it has (which is related to how heavy it is), the more energy it has".
"Does that mean that Uncle Bill has a lot of energy". My mom
laughed. Uncle Bill was fat.
"Yes, but you better not tell him that. Oh, also, that formula
became the foundation of the theory of relativity."
"What's that? Is that something about Uncle Bill too, because he's
related to us."
"No, honey, the the theory of relativity is not about our relatives.
It is ... you know I could use a refresher on that myself. Let me
ask my sister when I see her tonight, she knows this stuff cold, and I'll
tell you tomorrow during breakfast, OK." And she did. In fact, we spent
an evening reading the introduction to a book on the subject.
Well, last night was different. Not only did she not know the answer, she couldn't tell me if she'd ever get back to me. "Can't you find out for me, Mom". "I can't honey, honestly. There are questions for which there are no answers, and this is one of them." And I studied her trying to gauge if she was upset at me. Didn't look like she was. "Can we ask Dad?" "Sure, honey, why don't you, tomorrow morning, OK?" The next day, I did ask Dad, and he had the same thoughtful expression that Mom had: "You know, sweetie, that's a great question. Maybe you should ask the question to everyone you know. Even if they don't know the answer, maybe it'll get them thinking." So, that's why I am writing this down for all of you to answer (or to get that thoughtful look on your face).
So, let me tell you how I came to ask this question. Last weekend, my little brother Stephan and I were playing a game of chess. Now, Stephan, although he is 2yrs younger than I, is really good at chess. He would scrunch his face in concentration, point his finger at the board, and move it in imaginary moves before he made his move. Sometimes when I made my move, a smile would light his face as if he had predicted just such a move from me. He won more times than I did, and after he did, he would hug me and thank me for the game (He watched Dad with Mom once and ever since, he's been faithfully doing it). We loved to play and sometimes we'd play one game after another back to back for an entire day (or until Mom or Dad shooed us out to get some air).
This game was clearly going his way. I saw that he was going to win, and as he scrunched up his face to ponder his next move, a streak of mischief got hold of me. I started talking to him very fast while tracing moves with my finger "Stephan, if you move this rook here, no wait, take my pawn instead, or how about if you move the knight here, then if I move my bishop here, you can move your pawn here, no wait, how about..." and so on. I was trying not to laugh at the same time as he looked at me in bewilderment. Suddenly, he surprised my bursting into tears, and nothing I said would make him stop. Poor kid, I hadn't teased him like this in a long time. Mom walked into the room, looking inquiringly at me. The cool thing about my parents was that they assumed that tears were a normal part of life. They never stopped themselves from crying, and never assumed that whoever wasn't crying (me in this case) was guilty of making the other person cry. Very unlike my friend Julie's Mom who gets really upset at her if her younger sister cries, even if she had nothing to do with it.
"I was just teasing Stephan, when he started to cry".
"How were you teasing him?"
"Well, he was about to make his move, I thought he was going to win
and I felt like teasing him." And I told her how I had teased him.
Mom looked at me seriously. "Katya, next time you tease Stephan,
let him know that you're doing it. He thinks he's playing chess,
while you're playing a different game with him. You distracted his
concentration. In chess, that would be cheating.
Stephan had quietened down. Then he said to me as seriously as Mom:
"That's cheating Katya, that's not chess."
I said "Yes, Stephan, it is. I won't do it again"
That was last weekend. Last night the NBA playoffs were on TV. I am not a big fan of basketball, and neither is my Dad. But Mom is nuts about basketball. She doesn't watch the regular games, but she won't miss the playoffs, especially not the final games. During the games, Dad and I tease her about her fervor, and we enjoy watching her more than the game itself. She had her favorite teams and favorite players, and you just had to watch her face to know if her guy made the basket or missed it.
Last night's game was different for me. Somehow I got into the game. It was being played in Chicago and it was between the Indiana Pacers and the Chicago Bulls. The Bulls were strong and they totally outpowered the Pacers. Since I always cheer the underdog, I was rooting for the Pacers to come back into the game. And the player I had my eye on was Reggie Miller. A slim man with such intensity on his face, and such dedication I thought. Suddenly after inching closer and closer to the Bulls' score, in the final minute of the game, the Pacers were only down by 6 points. The ball was in Reggie's hands and a 3-pointer followed. I was on my feet hooting, while Mom had her face in her hands (she was rooting for Michael, there was no other for her). Now the Pacers were only down by 3 points, and the Bulls had the ball. Reggie was still in the Bulls' end and miraculously he intercepted a pass, turned around and popped the ball right into the basket. I could not believe it. They were only down by one, and I was whooping, yelling and jumping. Stephan peeked into the room to see what this fuss was all about.
There were only 23 seconds left in the game, and after a timeout, the Bulls had the ball again. They moved the ball up the court, and the Pacers were anxiously guarding Jordan trying to prevent him from getting the ball. But they couldn't, he was too quick, he got the pass and with just a few seconds left on the clock, fired the ball at the basket. It felt like a million eyes watched the ball as it arced toward the net, hit the rim, seemed like it was going in, but ended up bouncing off. There was a struggle for the ball, and a Pacer X won, but wait, he was fouled by Chicago. The buzzer rang indicating the end of the game. The Chicago coach was furious, the fans were angry and booing and hooting. The Pro-Chicago announcer was trying to dissect the TV replay to denounce the call. Nobody could believe this. Down by one, the Pacers had the chance to win the game, after being down by more than 10 points for most of the game. Jordan was talking to the referee, but to no avail. All the refs were unified in their resolution to award a foul. My Mom was torn and unhappy, but reluctantly admitted that yes, it was a foul.
So, Pacer X set up to take the shot, what they call the free throw. The announcer reeled off statistics on how poor Pacer X was in free throws. "54% during regular season and 58% during playoffs". Groan, why couldn't Reggie get the ball. Maybe Pacer X could at least make one throw and tie the score. Meanwhile there was pandemonium behind the Chicago backboard where Pacer X was going to take his free throw. I was shocked to see the things the spectators were waving. Lots of big white vertical things, a banner with the Bulls insignia held by a few people moving from side to side. Everybody was up on their feet shouting and screaming for Pacer X to miss the shot. And miss it, he did. Jeers turned to screams of joy as the stadium erupted. I was thinking "Please, make the next one, please, please. At least tie the game". Pacer X readied to take the shot. The Chicago fans did their utmost to distract him. He bounced the ball on the ground, held it, uncertain, bounced the ball again, tension seemingly poring out of every square inch of his body. Still the fans waved their big white things, and screamed at him to miss the shot. He held the ball, took a look at the sheer glass backboard with all hell breaking loose behind, and launched the ball. The ball hit the backboard, bounced toward the net, hit the edge of the rim, and bounced off.
The fans went nuts, Mom was up on her feet doing a little jig, and I had my head in my hands. I had had a sneaky suspicion that he was going to miss those free throws. It was the uncertainty in his manner as he faced those hostile fans. Well, the game was over, Chicago had won. It was late, and we were drained. All three of us had gotten completely involved in the game. Dad turned off the TV and I went to my bedroom. Mom followed me consoling me: "They played a great game, though, that's what counts". As she tucked me into bed, I turned to her and asked her the question: "Mom, what they were doing behind the backboard, that wasn't fair: they were distracting the poor guy from shooting the ball." "That's basketball, honey, that's how it is." "But, Mom, how can it be cheating for me to distract Stephan when he was going to make his move, and not cheating for all those people, who are not even playing the game to distract him from making his shot." The words just tumbled out of me: it seemed very unfair to me. But, maybe there was a good answer to it, and maybe Mom knew it. Mom just looked at me. And that's when she said what she did.