Taking Weekend Tennis Seriously

Here’s the best part about being the captain of a 4.5 USTA team: after playing a non-USTA team tennis league match against strangers who were well on their way to steamrolling my behind before my partner stepped in, placed me on her back while I’m kicking and screaming, and dragged both of us across the finish line to victory, I will, of course, ask those opponents, “Would you be interested in playing on my USTA team?”

Their response: “I’m a 4.5…um…is this a 4.5 team?”

That’s fun. Tennis is fun. Everyone should experience how much fun tennis is.

Speaking of which, I am actually captaining a 4.0 USTA team in addition to the 4.5 one this summer.

*Music screeches to a halt*

What?

No. No, I can’t play on the team. I mean, not this summer, anyway. When mid-year ratings come out though, I should be…

Yes, that’s right. I’m just captaining a tennis team…that I can’t play on.

What? Is that, like, not a usual thing people do or something? Huh. Oh! So sorry for my rudeness. We haven’t been properly introduced, yet…

Hi, I’m Christy!

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Remember when something weird happened with my knee back in August? Welp, guess what? I tore my anterior cruciate ligament.

Yes. That’s right. I tore my ACL.

For whatever reason, I can still play tennis. I mean, come on. It’s gotta be a pretty, pretty darn big deal for me not to play tennis, amirightoramiright?

What? Is tearing one’s ACL a big deal or something?

Remarkably, I’ve never had to stop playing tennis in all that time. The only thing that would happen is once a tennis outing, I would twist on my knee oddly and experience sharp pain. After taking a minute to walk it out, I would go right back to playing without any more incident the remainder of the match.

I don’t know how I’m still able to play tennis while other people aren’t as fortunate after ACL tears – my sister has admonished me about continuing to play so much, something about adrenaline numbing the pain…except there is no pain, I promise! – but I’ll probably end up tearing something else knee-related and will definitely need to have surgery then so it’s really all the same in the end. Is how the logic goes in my head.

To prolong the time till the inevitable knee explosion, I am now wearing a custom-fitted knee brace.

WHOOOOOOOOOOOO-HOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!

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Late last year, I was really looking forward to the recreational tennis off-season (November to February). This would have been my first tennis off-season with formal coaching. I had big plans. I was finally going to learn how to hit overheads, dear reader. Big, BIG plans.

Overheads terrorize the bed sheet marks out of me. I know. I ask myself the same question: will I ever run out of tennis strokes to be terrified by?

I’m shaking my head slowly and sadly. No.

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There’s something wrong with my tennis head that no Pink/Katy Perry/Sara Bareilles song can help me out of.

I wouldn’t wish this mental anguish on anyone. Anyone. This sucks. Playing scared is no way to play tennis.

How to describe it. Um…

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