Yesterday during our daily talk my Big Brother was telling stories about his younger life. This one was from his high school years. He and friends were waiting for a basketball court to open up. There was a girl's volleyball game going on at present and he and his buddies watched while they waited. He told me that this girl hit a tremendous spike at the net that went past the other team's members like a bullet and landed fair in the far corner. That prompted him to remember a similar incident.

One summer fifty years ago, maybe forty-nine or forty-eight, he and I were playing pick-up tennis against each other on the courts of a local small college. Completely unremarkable, we were always playing some sport. In this game, it must have been match point,  I hit a shot similar to the girl volleyball player that went into the equivalent corner as the girl volleyball player spiked the ball on her volleyball court. The ball landed at his feet and he immediately shouted “OUT!” And I immediately countered “IT WAS IN!” He had far  the better look at where the ball landed, he was standing right over it while I was clear across court. So I didn’t argue. It was a nothing thing. We have never talked about that tennis game with each other since that day and it had no effect on either of us or our relationship. In fact, neither of us remember anything else about that day except that shot. Why would we? It was no big deal. We didn’t have an argument or anything. 

But we both independently, half a century later, remembered that one shot. When the volleyball story prompted him to remember the tennis story, he said, “Dave, one time you and I were playing tennis…” and I immediately broke in, “I REMEMBER! WE WERE PLAYING AT ST. FRANCIS COLLEGE…” We were both amazed that the other remembered it. He said he thinks about that shot 3-4 times a year and now isn’t sure if the ball was in or out😂. At the end of our conversation he said in his understated, droll way, "Dave, I want to end this conversation with--"IT WAS OUT!" and we both cackled. Today when he called I premeditatedly picked up the phone and answered with faux determination, "IT WAS IN!" and we both laughed heartily. He said if he ran into a psychologist he was going to ask if they had any professional insight into why we both would remember such a nondescript, insignificant event as that almost fifty years later. 

I decided to relate this story to you, my readers. If you have any insight into the psychology of this, email my at publocc@gmail.com. Good night sweet princes and princesses.