I’ve always been a follower of the popular sports fads, but I never achieved expert or even “promising amateur” status in any of them, and now I wonder why I usually stuck to it, gathering insults and injuries instead of trophies.
There were the shin splints of jogging and the surgical splints of skiiing, but the worst were the psychological wounds suffered as a stubborn tennis rookie.
“Forty love again!” my opponent would shout for everyone on the other courts to hear and smirk at. There would be triumph in his voice and not a trace of pity. “Forty-humiliation!” was what he meant.
My tennis instructor had warned me against playing in singles matches. “It’s too fast a game for you right now,” he warned. But after watching me perform in a few doubles games, he was still not satisfied. “But there’s no such thing as a triples match,” I protested.
“Then how about switching to ping pong?” he said. “I don’t want any of my students physically or mentally injured. There’ll be no charge for your lessons if you’ll promise never to tell anyone I was your teacher.”
I decided to be self-taught with daily sessions of hitting the ball against a handball court wall to sharpen my eye and reflexes, playing imaginary games. I quit the day I lost 6-0, 6-2. The wall was learning faster than me.
I then began hanging out in public tennis courts until someone needed a partner or an opponent. I would step forward, faking a slight limp, hoping that might soften my opponent’s killer instinct. It never worked.
Now and then I’d manage to score a point when, reacting to a blazing serve, I’d raise my racket in self-defense and the ball would bounce off and land two or three inches on the other side of the net.
Under severe pressure I sometimes resorted to subterfuge. “OUT!” I would call with just the right mixture of authority and sympathy for my opponent. “You can’t be serious,” he’d complain. “It was decidedly out, old man,” I’d reply, and he would be sullen for the rest of the match, which usually affected his performance. The trick was, I never shouted, “Out of bounds!” What I meant was, “Out of reach!”
There came a day when I lost all hope and tossed out my expensive Wilson. (Didn’t that happen with Tom Hanks?) My wiles and my luck weren’t working. I had just been aced and imagined a wisp of smoke from my right sneaker which had been grazed by another well-aimed bullet serve. “Game, set and match!” my opponent shouted for all to hear.
“Beautiful form,” I replied, holding out a limp hand and smiling mechanically. “How about a rematch this evening? I’ve got a court reserved for nine.”
“Sorry, can’t make it. I’ve got homework to do and my Mom doesn’t let me stay out that late.”
Anyway, I always dreaded winning an important game and having to risk my neck leaping over the net. I’d already dropped out of my gymnastics class.
Imagine That 