What are you willing to do for what you really want?

The shoes pictured above hold significant meaning for me. At the beginning of my fascination with NBA basketball in the early 90s, these sneakers were released on the feet of David Robinson, one of my favorite players of that era. It was Nike's answer to Reebok's pump shoes, and it was the beginning of a host of imaginative gimmicks and advertisements/endorsements for basketball shoes that kept me dreaming about playing basketball. Most significantly though, this pair of shoes was one of the things I begged from my parents while standing before them on the store floor. I'm sure I asked my parents for plenty of things while shopping through the years, but these shoes were different, and because they were different I brought new tactics to the negotiating. They were expensive shoes; way too much for a 12-year-old kid in a family on a month-to-month budget. All I could think about was how much better I'd feel and play in these babies. It seemed like one of the first times I negotiated paying my mom back for the shoes if she would buy them for me. At the time it seemed like I'd be working for the rest of my life to pay off the debt, but it was all worth it in my little brain. I thought of all of the cleaning and chores that I would be willing to do if mom and dad would just cave in and purchase these shoes. I thought of all of the desirable tweenage boy attributes I would exemplify to the highest degree (a small sacrifice if I were to have these shoes laced to my feet). I must have tried talking them into buying these for 15 minutes; probably a record negotiation for me albeit an unsuccessful one.