Taking Weekend Tennis Seriously

I remember being the worst player in weekly round robin doubles outings and feeling sorry for the latest person who had to be stuck with me and take her turn losing a set. I remember being drop shotted and trick shotted upon ad nauseum. I remember not understanding why I was losing doubles matches to people who I felt like didn’t possess anywhere near the quality of groundstrokes as I did. I remember being labeled over and over and over again as a singles player after doubles matches and hating it. I remember trying to beat this particular partnership in practice matches for nearly a year, falling in straight sets every time, and on at least one occasion, shedding tears over the seemingly hopelessness of it all. I remember losing to pushers. I remember not knowing how to volley. I remember not playing myself in tough, must-win team matches – much to the confusion of my teammates – because I didn’t have confidence in my tennis game. I remember needing to prove my tennis abilities to everyone. I remember forgetting how to hit forehand groundstrokes and feeling so very lost. I remember ducking from screaming balls coming straight at me when I was at the net. I remember being blown off the court by vicious baseline groundstroke winners. I remember being mad at my partner for making ME look bad. I remember being bumped up to 4.5 and when I asked someone to join my newly created 4.5 team, she said “Ah, looking to get into the 4.5 captaining game already, huh?”

I remember. I remember because every once in awhile I’ll be jarred into one of these memories after a tennis outing in which I’m startled by how different my experiences are today than they’ve been over the last five years.

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