The ball is dark and already falling from the blue summer sky. Like a minor, tragic, ill-fated character in a futuristic totalitarian novel (set in the kind of world where adjectives spread berserkly) I am conditioned to run. I run. The ball is a long way to my right. The boundary rope is inches to the side of the soles of my cricket boots. If I leap and stretch out my hand the moment of glory will surely be mine. Though watch the ball. I have to watch the ball! First rule of cricket. Which means Im not looking where I leap. The foot lands and then the knee somehow snaps, with an audible crack. And my first thought? I have not caught the ball. Later, when