First grade fright fest

Before he retired, my oldest brother was a professional basketball player.  He is exactly seven feet tall and weighs 280 pounds.  He played for numerous professional teams in the United States and all over the world.  My dear friend Josie is a first grade school teacher and asked my brother to come speak to her class.  My brother is very nice and loves children so as soon as his schedule allowed he flew back to Illinois to oblige.  When Josie told the Principal at her school that she had a professional athlete of such stature coming in, the meet and greet quickly went from Josie's classroom to about 4 classrooms.  When my brother and I arrived at the school the children were already assembled in the gym.  We stood out in the hallway while the teachers organized the students.  A few minutes before it was time for my brother to come into the gym I quietly stepped in and took a seat off to the side.  The students were finally all seated and quiet, Josie gave a wonderful introduction about who the special guest was and a few of his accomplishments, basketball music played in the gym as Josie called out his name and the children all began cheering and clapping.  My brother came running into the gym with lots of energy and a big smile on his face.  The children  took one look at him and majority of them began screaming and crying in fear.  Josie and the other teachers jumped into action to calm the children and my brother quickly left the gym.  I just as quickly went to the hallway to find him standing there upset because he scared the kids.  I consoled him the best I could ~ while trying not to laugh.  Josie came out to the hallway, told him the kids are all OK and asked him to please come back out, of course he agreed.  Josie reached out and took my brothers huge hand into her little dainty hand and lead him back into the gym.  The children sat there silently, some still looking wild eyed.  My brother spoke as softly as his very deep voice allowed, the more he talked the more you could see the kids relax and begin smiling and enjoying him.  By the time he was done talking and demonstrating his basketball tricks the children absolutely loved him (which was no surprise because everyone loves him!)  The meet and greet ended with my brother standing under one of the basketball hoops, the children all lining up single file, and one by one he picked up each child and let them 'Dunk' the basketball into the hoop, each and every child giggled and squealed in delight.  He was even nice enough to let them all go twice.   It was the cutest thing I had seen in a long time.