Taking Weekend Tennis Seriously

Hello, Dear Reader!

I know.

I’ve been away. 🙁

The honest reason for it? I just didn’t feel like writing.

2016, the year I last published a blog post – all two of them, wasn’t a great year. I started therapy that February. I was still trying to prove myself at 4.5 with my early successes in the year proving to be a flash in the pan, and it was quite the adventure every time I played singles, my supposed strength. I had a poor season as USTA captain: after winning Fall Playoffs and thus a Wildcard spot into Summer Playoffs, my summer USTA team was that team that would get blown out in the postseason, winning just one line out of ten (the opponent retired…one guess as to why). And I had the “pleasure” of learning a lot about friendships with my inner tennis circle looking a lot differently by year’s end.

There’s a memory from 2016 that epitomizes the year for me: the Nationals-caliber team I rode the bench on advanced to Sectionals (the level of USTA Playoffs before Nationals for my area). By the time the last Sectionals match rolled around, we were out of it so I got to play. From the way her entourage was cheering my opponent on, I had the thought that she was also her team’s scrub who was being thrown a bone of Sectionals action. (Looking her up, it’s actually that she doesn’t normally play singles and for whatever reason was thrust into singles duty that day.)

So not only am I playing someone whose every winning point is being wildly cheered as if she’s Rudy recording a story-book ending sack on his only collegiate defensive snap in his last opportunity to play for Notre Dame at home, I’m also playing awfully because it’s 2016 Christy and I a) am not an upper tier 4.5 player yet and b) couldn’t take the pressure of trying to impress my very impressive teammates. And to add insult to injury, my captain thought I was playing well (I assure you I was not) so the bar was low, dear reader. So very low.

I ended up splitting sets. And then couldn’t finish the match because I cramped up from no doubt all the self-inflicted stress, the heat, and my tendency to cramp up during exactly those circumstances.

So my Sectionals opponent’s only 4.5 singles win in her life is against me.

That was my 2016.

2017 was basically the depressing fallout from the destruction that was 2016. I got replaced on the Nationals-caliber team by a much better player, and that 2017 super team went to Nationals. My 4.5 summer team that I captained was maddeningly close to advancing to the postseason, but four 2-3 losses in the middle of the season did us in. And the most searing memory from that year was of my fall team unexpectedly advancing to playoffs and awesomely beating the Big Bad of our flight, which meant all we had to do was win our match-up against the much less scary team and we would have once again been fall champions.

Of course we lost. 2-3. I was apart of one of the losing lines with my partner and I losing in three heartbreaking sets. It’s still a sore subject.

(But those playoffs also produced one of my favorite tennis stories/matches and I’ll share that in a future post.)

December of 2017 I finally had ACL replacement surgery after tearing it three years prior. I don’t recommend people tearing their ACL. The first half of 2018 was spent butting heads with my physical therapist. I tried to be fine with captaining a non-competitive team, and I learned I absolutely don’t enjoy that experience and won’t be doing that again anytime soon.

But things were on the up and up. Something clicked for me with my singles game, and I was playing my best tennis right before surgery. I also started coaching tennis during the second half of 2017 and found it very rewarding with the bonus side effect of it doing wonders for my own tennis game.

Speaking of doing wonders, psychotherapy has been great. I feel like a totally different person from my before therapy-self. My temperament on and off the court has changed quite a bit. And stuff that’s the same? I’m good with those aspects of myself. 😀

At the time of publication, the summer USTA team I captain (as well as the weekend team I’m on but don’t captain) is undefeated and in first place. We’ve clinched Playoffs (Playoffs is a Big. Deal. in case that hasn’t been made clear throughout this post). My tennis game has never been better; I’m very confident about my abilities on the court these days; and I’ve eased up quite a bit on feeling like I have to prove something when I play.

And most importantly as it pertains to you, dear reader: I’ve missed writing about this crazy adult recreational tennis world that we’re apart of. And boy do I have a lot of thoughts stored up about it.

Wanna hear them? ?