Hack that Sack Over Here, Dude!

You probably first saw these guys at college. Or maybe in high school if you lived in a college town or a Hippie communion. There's usually half-a-dozen or so of them, standing in a rough circle. Grateful Dead or Allman Brothers is wafting out of a cheap boom box off to the side. If you're far away, you wonder why the heck they're taking turns jumping up and kicking at the air. They're quick on their feet and wiry, but they're dressed more like surfers and anti-war demonstrators than athletes.

Once you're up close you see that they're kicking and nudging a small beanbag back and forth. You can't tell if they're competing or cooperating. They alternate between cheering and mocking each other. All of them are named "Dude". At least that's what they call each other.

I'm not sure Hackeysack, or Footbag, as it is called by serious aficionados, fits any strict definition of street sports -- its more suburban than urban, and it hasn't been around long enough to be fully embedded in our folk culture (its inventors claim 1972 as its genesis). But kids in the suburbs have been just as creative in their play as city kids, and Hackeysack is the ultimate in informal sports. Every group of "hackers" creates its own structures and language, though this diversion's culture is now spreading on a national level.

The Worldwide Footbag Organization (http://www.footbag.org) is a sure indicator of the mainstreaming of this sport. The sport now features regular judged, choreographed competitions and Footbag Net games, in which individuals or teams keep the bag aloft and propel it back and forth across a thigh-high net. The atmosphere of these gatherings still has a "hippy" flavor to it, but the athletes are serious. They've got rules (http://ifc.footbag.org/contents.html).

A proficient hacker can use almost any body surface (except the arms of course) to stall or strike the bag. Their feet are quick, accurate, and capable of fine nuances in power and direction. Creativity is encouraged and usually takes precedence over any regulation. I remember one guy who hung around my college -- I don't think he was taking classes, but who knows -- who could stoop down and halt the footbag on one shoulder blade, roll it to the other, pop it up in the air and "jester" it gently to his neighbor. (The Jester is one of my favorite moves, in which the hacker reaches one foot behind the other leg to pop the bag up). Hackeysack was like an energetic dance to him. If he screwed it up, he fell over and laughed. And looked for a cigarette. Just writing this has me searching in my basement for an old Hackeysack. There aren't enough games like it around anymore.

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