Dear the good ole' game of Tennis,
It’s been awhile, like a really long while. You’re probably shocked to hear from me after I threw the towel in on you and declared “I am on a permanent hiatus until the age of 65." You were a constant in my life for 17 years. In fact, you played such a big part in not only my childhood but my high school and college years too.
Our story originally began when I would crawl into Mom and Dad’s bed at the age of four and watch the U.S. Open early on Saturday mornings in late August. I always knew dad was a huge fan of you since he ingrained it in my head that “it’s one of the most valuable abilities to have as you get older”. I was a happy-go-lucky, sports-obsessed child who was all about anything that my parents did especially if a ball and sneakers were involved. Many mornings throughout my childhood, Dad would leave the house before sunrise to play tennis with one of his old pals at the courts a ways from our house that he had been playing at for years. I remember every time he woke me with his “see you later” kiss, on my forehead, before he headed off to the courts, I would wish so badly that I could join him and keep up with him and his pal Bob.
I was just a tiny tot at five years old when Mom, Dad, big brother, and I showed up at Team Shark Attack Tennis for my very first private lesson. I loved every minute of it. My coach was this intimidating, striking guy named Mark who I was borderline terrified of but let me tell you, he knew what he was talking about. My days with Mark the Shark may have begun when I was five but they didn’t wrap up until I was about 16. I spent three days a week, almost every week, from Kindergarten to Tenth grade with Mark and his wildly effective, extremely intense program. Whether it was private lessons, tournaments, clinics, holiday parties, camp, you name it, I was at North Hampton Tennis and Fitness, for one reason or another. The older I got the more and more tennis became a focal point in my life. Once I got pretty decent I became very devoted to moving up in the tennis world. I would sign up for any tournament that wasn’t on the other side of the state, we did venture pretty close to it though. Thank goodness for two parents who were all about it and never said boo to a goose about all the far off places I made them drive to during early mornings, snow evenings and everything in between. I was totally and completely obsessed with tracking my ranking and reading the USTA magazine like it was my job. When the weather was nice I would go to camp all day, come home, eat a quick dinner, and beg someone, anyone, to go hit some balls with me. The possibility of getting sick of the sport was so foreign to me that I couldn’t even comprehend when people would say “I’m not in the mood to play."
Boy, was I blinded by the turn of events that was about to occur in regard to my feelings toward the beautiful game of tennis. I waited nine years before I finally could represent my school as a member of the tennis team. I could not wait. The first day of tennis practice in 7th grade I was an eager beaver. Ecstatic would be an understatement. Middle school tennis was fine but it was just a waiting game till I would get to the real deal of playing tennis for my high school.
In 9th grade I was still in middle school (yeah, my district does things wacky, middle school is 7-9) but I made the varsity tennis team over at the high school. I was on cloud nine. Hanging out with older girls, a part of a legit team, playing my favorite sport, what could possibly be better? Well, my 9th grade season was great but the tide sure did take a turn for my 10th grade season.
The sport I once could not get enough of was now a chore. I would sit in fourth block and cross my fingers that it would miraculously start raining so that practice would be canceled. I used to be the first one out to the courts for practice and now I slowly made my way out hitting every detour I could possibly think of. My motivation to succeed was still there so I was still performing well I just deep down was counting the seconds until I could walk off the court for the day. The countdown occurred, I would say, three out of five days of the week.
Junior and senior season were rough. I was supposed to be living my dream. I was one of the better players on my varsity team for the high school I adored. But I was keeping a big, dark secret from everyone, including myself. I never really came to terms with how much I was simply going through the motions because I was just so gosh, darn conflicted about tennis. I couldn’t imagine not having tennis in my life. Quitting the team was absolutely not an option but looking forward to tennis only happened on match days and even that excitement began to dwindle season by season. Seeing how invested, excited, and devoted my parents were about my tennis career made it impossible for me to deal with my lackluster emotions towards the sport. They were so involved and so supportive about every aspect of my game that I just didn’t have the heart to even entertain the idea that maybe I wasn’t in it for the right reasons at all.
My days of curling up on the couch watching tennis with my parents came to a screeching halt. My infatuation with James Blake, Andre Agassi and Maria Sharapova even dwindled. I watched a few minutes before my disinterest got the best of me and I would flee the room. Every twist and turn I would be in this ever losing battle between wanting literally nothing to do with the sport and keeping the image on that I was this tennis girl who lived for the game. I just could not let myself down, my parents down, or my school down. As far as everyone was concerned I was a tennis girl and that’s what I was sticking to.
Although my dislike for the sport began as a sophomore in high school, tennis continued to play a crucial part in my life. I was still in denial about my true tennis feelings so my freshman year of college was spent on the courts. I kick myself sometimes when I say “I hate tennis”. I cringe when I say it because although I needed my space from the sport and lost the love I once had for it, it also saved my life. Tennis got me through one of the hardest experiences of my life. My freshman year in college was spent at a school that was not anything I imagined for myself but it was tennis that kept me content and motivated to get to my dream school. Tennis gave me a reason that year to keep chugging through the toughest days of my life. Tennis kept me busy and focused. Tennis gave me the opportunity to know what it is like to play a college sport (it was DIII, don’t get too excited), it gave me an opportunity to have a spring break I would have otherwise spent sulking on my parents couch, it gave me perspective and life lessons that I needed more than I ever realized. Tennis was a lifesaver I loved to hate on during that year.
I was still in denial about my feelings towards tennis even after I transferred to Elon for my sophomore year in college. On one hand, I was thrilled to finally be done with the tennis commitment that had always followed me but on the other hand, I had convinced myself and my parents that I would join the club tennis team at Elon. I went along with that plan for a solid two days before I had a total and complete tennis meltdown. I walked off the court that brisk, fall day during parents weekend in 2014 and declared I was “on a tennis hiatus”. I didn’t care who, what, when, where or why; you were not getting me on the court. Case closed.
Sophomore year came and went and tennis was basically nowhere to be found in my life. I had a tennis racquet hidden in the corner of my room and some old tennis sneakers under my bed but other than that I was not a tennis player in my book. Despite my complete disaffiliation with the sport, I headed up to Maine to be a tennis counselor at an overnight camp. I was still in denial about my true feelings for tennis, clearly. Why the heck would I sign up for a minimum of four hours of tennis five days a week? Was I nuts? The thought of playing five minutes made me cringe. I got through the summer in one piece but it was then that I really came to terms with the fact that I needed to stop pretending and start acting on my feelings. I faked my way through the camper/counselor tennis tournament and then decided it was time, I was ready, mentally and emotionally, to hang up the racquet and call it quits. What proceeded was months and months of hating on the very thing that at one time, for a very long time, was one of the most important aspects of my life. I had been forcing tennis in my life for so long that nothing but anger came out about it. I was not well, I needed to step away from the court.
It has been about nine months since I step foot on a tennis court and I think my need for a tennis drought is finally wrapping up. I finally gave myself time to deal with my need to take a break. I no longer was overcompensating with extra tennis time. There has been zero tennis in my life. My anti-tennis phase has led into an understanding of what exactly I was going through as I continued to involve myself in something that made me so unhappy, year after year after year. I have come to understand the need that tennis provided me. Tennis was my identity, my activity, and the thing I understood so easily, I wasn’t ever self-aware enough to understand my needs and take it somewhere else.
Throughout my “hate” phase, I began to forget all the positives that tennis brought me. I diminished the fact that playing tennis with my family in Sarasota, Florida is easily top five on my list of childhood memories. I somehow forgot how thrilled I was to march off to the wall at my middle school while my parents watched me from the car on summer evenings. I deleted the memories of being on the court with my brother Joel. My inability to come to terms with my feelings took over.
Lately, I have been thinking that I might finally, possibly, perhaps be ready to give it a swing one of these days but boy was it a process.
Love,
The girl who hated to love and loved to hate you
