MARBLES

I'm losing. How long since I have lost? Have been the best since the start of the new school year, the best player in the whole third grade.

Didn't bother me to lose my `cats eyes', the `purees' can be replaced. But when I heard the clank of Dannys shooter hitting my creamy purple marble with the thin swirling stripes of green, something tore. No longer a game of skill between two kids, this is dead serious business now. Not a matter of winning only the urge to destroy. Insufficient to just capture Dannys prized marbles, I want them shattered left littered in the sand. "You can't use `steelies' for shooters", Danny complains. Who says so.