Who's In?

My goal had been to start this blog around the beginning of August. Because shortly before that time I had resolved upon another cockamamie goal: to enter a tennis tournament in the fall. In July, that seemed far away. I thought I would make posts about my progress and methodology of preparation. Hah. Now, presuming I enter a tournament in October, it’s a month away!

Why would I take up this daft notion? I broke my hand in May playing basketball. Annoying, completely nondramatic mishap of contact with a finger at a bad angle. Crack. So I didn’t play basketball for two months (had two screws put in to stabilize the left fifth metacarpal), but as it was my off hand, I started playing tennis again.

Maybe one defining characteristic of the subset of people I think I’m addressing here (in my mind at least, hello ladies and gentlemen) is a tendency toward goal orientation. It’s hard to do something and not think about ways to get better, to look for measurable improvement, to compete. So, I start playing tennis again and think, this is fun, I gotta enter a tournament so I can see how I do, then do it again next year to see if I can get better. Why is that?

Dunno, but so it is. I started playing basketball ten years ago and became obsessed with learning and improving, not just playing. Trouble with tennis is finding people and time and suitable weather and location to play. There are partner matching services online, and I’ve tried one called Gotennis.com, but so far haven’t heard back from anyone I’ve contacted through the site. I’ll report back how it goes, or if I explore the site further and find anything else of use.

While I’ve thought a lot about playing, and still may enter that tournament in October, I really haven’t played even once a week. But, here, with the first day of September, I’ll see if I can make up some lost time. I really have to iron out my backhand. As a kid I used a one-hander, a few years ago I switched to two, with the broken hand I went back to one, and now feel full of confusion.

In any event, I’ll be able to report on how mortifying the whole thing is. Wonder if anyone will play with me before Labor Day….