Friday, September 18, 2009

I'm in Love with Her and I Feel Fine

I'm rather antsy today. This could be because I've had both coffee and tea today, but I think it's more that I know that I'm going to have a busy afternoon. Actually, it will be less busy than yesterday's, but it's the experiences of yesterday that probably have me antsier than normal.

Last week I signed up for a tennis tournament in Martinez, a suburb of Augusta. Augusta is about three hours from my house, but I figured the worst-case scenario would be that I'd have to leave work a little early on Friday for my first match. It turns out that I didn't pay enough attention to the dates of the tournament and it started on Thursday. My first match was at 6 p.m. yesterday, meaning I left my parapro with assignments to keep my students busy for the last 30 minutes of class and then rushed to my car and hauled ass (at speeds that, while technically over the speed limit, weren't high enough to draw unwanted attention from law enforcement). I managed to show up at the tennis facility 10 minutes before my match, changed clothes and then had to wait about ten minutes for the other two guys to show up.

This is a doubles tournament and I'm playing men's doubles with my soon-to-be brother-in-law and mixed doubles with my wife while soon-to-be brother-in-law plays doubles with my sister. STB BIL has never to my knowledge formally played tennis beyond hitting around with friends and, honestly, the only time I've hit with him before yesterday, he was horrible. All of his shots ended up in the net or over the fence. That was okay. I didn't enter this tournament to win. I entered this tournament as a warm up for my big invitational tournament in two weeks. As long as I get in a few matches, I'm happy and considering both of my draws are round robins, I'm guaranteed five matches this week.

Turned out that STB BIL wasn't as bad as I thought. He's a natural at the net, more athletic than I am. He makes a lot of rookie mistakes, but not so many that I felt like we lost because of him. In fact, I blame most of the score on myself. I played horribly last night. After driving for three hours, I got out of the car to find out that my serve was still MIA and that my forehand, which had been dominant the last time I played, had apparently gone looking for my serve and had not yet returned. K told me to chalk it up to the ride and nerves of trying to be on time and cutting it that close. Personally, I think it's more likely that I just suck.

Anyway, after all of that, I had to drive the almost three hours back home (while listening to my beloved Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets be embarrassed by a Miami team that hasn't beaten the Jackets since they've been an ACC team), get up this morning and come back to work knowing that I'm going to have to duck out early once again (thank goodness for parapros) and race northward to get there in time for another 6 p.m. start time.

I'd really rather be outside on the courts looking for my serve. Honestly, my brain is already there. Isn't my amateur athletic success more important than the education of future generations?

2 comments:

Julie said...

Matt was rather upset by the game as well. I'm sorry you had to come home to that. It is definitely not the fix for a bad day.

You really must love the sport. I would not drive that far unless I had to... especially on a weeknight.

courtney said...

I admire your commitment to tennis. Perhaps your serve will recognize your determination and make a reappearance soon.