Effervescence

 I have not followed basketball or really any sports closely for the last few decades.  I play along and enjoy watching them but would never call myself a fan of any team or sport for that matter.  I just watch with detachment.  Until this final series with the Knicks and the Spurs.  It all started really with a playful exchange with Lou's grandson Braden who is a BIG Spurs fan.  So when the finals began and he was into it, I teased him with some harmless banter of "Go New York, go New York, go!"  And Lou and I of course now had to watch the games - so I could hold my own when I saw the little squirt. 😉.  

Every game started the same, the Spurs whooping the Knicks ass in the first half only to be overcome by the Knicks WILL to never give up and keep fighting to the final buzzer.  They did lose Game 3 but the other four games were all remarkable comebacks I am so glad I got to witness.  And because our phones are always listening and paying attention to what we are interested in, my Instagram feed began to fill with the poetic energy and togetherness that was happening in my home state/city.  Two thousand miles away I could feel the connectedness that this championship was fostering in what is considered one of the toughest, roughest, and least friendly places to live. 😂 It was inspiring.  

Admittedly I am slightly addicted to the energy and joy that is being felt in that part of the country right now.  Ask Lou, I am stuck on the 'gram.  She has heard more Alicia Keys and Frank Sinatra today that she could have ever imagined over her lifetime.😂 While joy scrolling I can across this and it explains EXACTLY why I feel the way I do about this silly ass game, and win.

"Why the Knicks win feels bigger than basketball right now.

The Knicks aren't just winning games, they are creating something humans desperately need right now... Collective Effervescence.  Collective effervescence is what happens when thousands or millions of people experience the same emotion at the same time. Joy. Hope. Anticipation. Belonging. Together. The term was coined by Emile Durkheim who noticed that humans are transformed when they gather around something larger than themselves. A ritual. A belief. A shared purpose.

Sports might be of the last places we regularly experience it.  Stranger hugging strangers. Entire cities holding their breath.  Everyone watching the same clock count down. 

For a few hours, the usual divisions disappear. Politics. Income. Age. Background.  We are simply people hoping for the same outcome. 

That's why the energy around the Knicks feels so electric. It's not just basketball.  It is a city remembering how to gather. How to celebrate. How to dream together. Collective Effervescence reminds us that joy is contagious, hope spreads, emotion moves through crowds like a current through a wire."  - Barri Leiner Grant

This resounds with me.  I long so desperately for this positive energy to be flowing through my days.  The metaphor this silly game has given me is exactly what I need right now.  Keep fighting, stay determined, never give up hope for a better, more fair, more kind, more just world that we can create.  

I don't expect anyone to become a Knicks fan from today, shiiiiiit, I'm pretty sure I won't all of a sudden start following them, but if you need a pick me up... read about their players, read about the transition the city has been going through and you too will start to feel that glimmer of joy and hope that has been absent in recent years.  This is not any kind of post against the Spurs, with a bit more experience they will be on the other side of this.  This is simply a post about an overwhelming feeling of joy for humanity.  

If this event hasn't had impact on you, that is perfectly okay.  I hope with all my heart you DO get to experience this feeling in your lifetime no matter what form it comes in.  I've been blessed enough to have two distinct events that have had this impact on me... and I will bottle it up and let it fuel me through the darker times.  

I love y'all!!!