My favorite tennis partner
Where to begin… I haven’t played tennis since my late 20s and now I’m 53.
When Craig and I were first dating, he used to say to me that he thought it would be fun if we could be a runner couple. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
No.
If you know me well enough, you are laughing along with me. I hate running. I did a running experiment for a while and I accomplished my goal — to run a straight mile without stopping or feeling like I was going to die — and then I stopped. Just like that. Because like I said, I hate running.
But that said, I understood what he wanted: something we could do together. Beyond going to the gym or practicing pilates at home. Something more… engaging.
So he started asking me to play tennis, knowing I had played when I was younger. I had been thinking about it for quite some time before I even met him, but I always decided no because dance was(is) my life and I thought, why do something during which I could get injured and be limited in my dancing?
But then I had two frozen shoulders over the course of the last year or so. Due to no sudden injury. They just… happened (which they can). I got shots but not surgery and I worked my ass off by myself with not PT besides my own PT to get my shoulders back in working order.
Every. Single. Day.
One is 100% better and the other lingers around 95% (but I know that will also get to 100).
And then suddenly, one morning not too long ago, I announced to him out of the blue that we would be buying rackets that day. (This is often how I function. Seemingly suddenly but there’s been a lot going on in the background.)
I have loved the sport of tennis since I was a tiny girl, sitting just outside the fence, watching her father play. (He was truly gifted. For real.) I would sit with the big red thermos (you probably had one like it), and just watch … for hours.
When I got to be about 8, I think, he would then let me hit a few balls when he was done, and so it started.
I got on the boys’ tennis team in high school because there was no girls’ team and so they had to let me try out and I succeeded. But I never got as good as I could have because I didn’t work hard. I half assed. (That’s another and longer story.)
Around the age of 23, I was playing tennis at a court at Penn State Behrend and the tennis coach got all excited, thinking I was a student, and telling me he could probably get me some scholarship money. He had seen me rush the net and play hard, something that was rare for him to see in those days from a female player.
Alas, I was no longer a student but the memory is a loved one, for sure.
Fast forward to about a month ago, we got our rackets, and got home late, so we waited until the next day to go play.
I was so freaking nervous. I have serious public performance anxiety with everything BUT dance. I hate people seeing me struggle. (Another long story right there.)
I told him, “If there are a lot of people already playing, I’m not playing. You can just practice serving.” He was okay with that.
There were a lot of people playing. But I got on the court and the second I bounced the ball, I was in it.
And I kinda sucked. OF COURSE I DID. It’s been about 25 years. But I also kinda… didn’t.
We play about three times a week and here’s the point of this long blog… I am relearning all the things that dance taught me at the age of 40.
First, play is the most important thing we can do for our mental health. Do something you love but here’s the kicker… do something that makes you LAUGH. I LAUGH a lot on the court.
But also? Do something that you love that brings out your inner “warrior.” I growl and yell on the court just as much as I laugh. Guess what? I am having just as much fun whichever I am doing.
Second, when I am moving on the tennis court, there is NOTHING ELSE IN MY WORLD. And in those moments, I am ABSOLUTELY FREE.
Dance taught me that at 40 and I was a bit shocked when I realized that tennis was teaching me the same lesson. Again, do the things you love… the physical things… because it is this level of embodiment that brings us into a state of total alignment with ourselves and this life.
Third, I am built to move. So are you. So are all of us. But I am really really built to move. I mean, there is no depression, no anxiety, no anything but the true me when I am moving. (Again, same for you. You just need to find right things.)
Fourth, I love life when and after I move. Because we are bags of chemicals and movement stirs up all the good ones.
I’m sure there’s more but that’s enough for now.
Go play! Now!