PLAYMATE

Sweet Neighbor Girl came over yesterday morning to try to rid herself of boredom. You know a kid is desperate when she has no one to hang out with but the 62-year-old Flaming Bore.

She had an "official" Spalding NBA basketball with her, so I challenged her to a few dribbling tricks--around the world, under the leg, etc., and then I about knocked her out, twice, with my superior passing techniques. Oops! Fortunately, she didn't run home crying to tattle on me.

We decided playing on the front porch might be safer. She turned her basketball into a legless cheerleader wannabe named Lucinda. Lucinda could do superior sommersaults and spins, but doing the splits and high kicks were impossible for her, so "she" mainly sat on a chair and watched as Sweet Neighbor Girl showed us various cheers. I admire her imagination. It's pretty much equal to my own bizarro behavior when I was her age, although I've gotta admit that none of my make-believe friends ever took the form of a basketball. Kudos to her for that one.

She is also much more adept than I ever was at real human being cheerleading.

"I'm going to be a cheerleader when I get older," she informed me.

"Well, you'd be a good one. You're very coordinated and you know how to do a cartwheel.

"Plus, I have a great smile," she added.

"That's right. Smiles are important."

"Were you ever a cheerleader?" she asked.

"Oh, no. I wasn't good enough. But I was in Pep Club, so I knew all the cheers and I had a loud mouth. Being able to yell is important, too." I taught her an old chant I recalled and she put her own little movements to it.

"I'm going to teach this to the girls when school starts next week," she said, pleased with herself.

Ah, next week. A week from today, in fact, school reconvenes in our little burg. Back to the books. What a bummer. No more lazy summer morning visits from Sweet Neighbor Girl to entertain me. It sure is going to be boring around here.