SPEAKING OF VALUES

I’ve heard of basketball games being won by the team with superior talent. I’ve also heard of games being won by the team that got a lucky break. I even know of one NBA Finals game that was won because the officials refused to call a blatant push-off foul on the reigning league superstar (you know he pushed off - you KNOW he did! Not that I’m bitter...). But I never heard of a game being won by cell phone technology. At least, not until now. It happened last Thursday night during the opening round of our local church league tournament. The teenage boys in our congregation had been looking forward to this tournament for a long time. They knew they had a good shot at the title if they could get all of the players to all of the games. This had been a problem in previous years, when it seemed that something always came up to prevent our players from making it to the gym on time. And it looked like that was going to happen again this year. One of our best players, Austin, had a city league tournament game scheduled for the exact same time as our first church league game, and he felt that his first obligation was to his city league team. We hoped that we would draw a lesser opponent for the opening round of the tournament, thinking that if we could win the first game without Austin, he could join us for the rest. Unfortunately, our first game was against one of the best teams in the tournament. They had size, speed and skill, and it looked like they actually practiced once in a while (a foreign concept to our team, I’m afraid). The game before ours ran a little long, and so we had plenty of time to sit and worry about how we were going to stop these guys without Austin. At the start of the game we were holding our own, and we actually had a slight lead at the end of the first quarter. At halftime we were still ahead, but just barely - and the other team was really warming up. I looked at my watch - it was just about the time that Austin’s game should have been ending. I decided to text him and let him know that we were running late, and if he hurried right over after his game he might still make it in time. By the end of the third quarter things were looking grim for us. The other team had taken the lead, and our team was struggling. You could look in their eyes and see the first faint flickering of impending defeat. Just as the fourth quarter started my cell phone buzzed. It was a text from Austin: “Should I still come?” I texted back one word: “Hurry!” By the time Austin burst through the gym doors we were down by seven with about six minutes to play. His insertion into the lineup energized the entire team. Our opponents didn’t score again the rest of the game, and we ran off 12 straight points to win by five. After the game I congratulated Austin on his game-winning performance. “I didn’t win the game,” he said. “You did!” I probably looked puzzled. I forget a lot of stuff these days, but I was pretty sure I would remember if I had played in the game that just ended. Austin smiled and held up his cell phone. “I wouldn’t have come if you hadn’t texted me,” he said. “You did it!” “Not me,” I said, holding up my phone and toasting his with it. “God bless technology!” I think that’s the first time in my life I’ve ever uttered that phrase. More often I’ve been inclined to castigate technology for its intrusive excesses. I have been critical of its divisive impact on families, its numbing effect on morality and its incendiary potential in the market place of public opinion. I don’t often stop to think about the good things that come into our lives as a result of technology. I can communicate with my children wherever they are, whenever I need them. I can reach out to my extended family in meaningful ways that were never before possible. And I recently joined a social networking web site that has enabled me to reconnect with dear friends from my high school days - wonderful people who I haven’t seen or heard from in years. Like so many other things in life, technology can be both a blessing and a curse. I guess it all depends on how we choose to use it at the end of the day. Or even at the end of the game.