Flashes

This morning I woke up and looked at my watch. The date immediately settled with me. There was an image that accompanied it.

At the beginning of sixth grade I was sentenced to two years in braces. While waiting at the orthodontist, I remember picking up a Sports Illustrated and flipping through it. Too uninterested to read any of the articles, I focused on the pictures. As the magazine pages slid out from under my right hand across to my left thumb, a black and white photo exposed itself. It was a picture of Pele suspended in the air with the ball frozen above his foot. The caption paid homage to him by celebrating his birthday: October 21, 1940.