Today, I write something different from the norm. I am here to give myself at least one little teaspoon of praise. Those poor souls who either purposefully or accidentally wander through the ghastly diatribes found here and who then favor me with a lovely day-making comment, will usually do so for certain entries. Those being the ones where I first puff myself up a bit and then tear into myself with the slashing of self-mockery. Not self-hatred as so many of my generation seem to practice but mockery, to have a good laugh at myself. My heroes in life, Franklin, Twain and many more, taught me that this is essential to avoid the pitfall of taking ones self too seriously. And so I practice that fine art daily or at least try to. But one must also realize what makes one unique and worthy as well, to avoid that self-loathing thing as well. To that end...
Last night I attended my mixed doubles tennis teams' practice. It's a new team for me and few of the members are familiar with my "style" of playing. I ended playing with a young lady who was easily the worst out there. I took this as a wonderful challenge to overcome. During one point, an opponent hit an excellent shot, nearly unreturnable. I LIVE for returning the unreturnable. These courts are not great really and kind of tacky and so rather than sliding as I dove, my foot caught up underneath me, sending me hard onto the court. A collective *gasp* was heard. I get up, sweat pants torn feeling blood running down my leg from the "rug burn" sort of injury that occurred. I smiled and said "good shot" and got ready to resume play. I heard some one yell "we'll have none of that!", some chick said "like I always say, sometimes you just have to turn around and say good shot and forget it". What? But there were many comments like that. Let's see last week you people won ZERO matches? HMMM! How do you not play as hard as you can on every shot?
You see you practice to establish habits which will help you in matches. What habits are being established by this?
I think this is an apt metaphor for life. So many people everyday when the ball comes over the net, point that their partner should have had it, or it's too hard to get to, or it's just one shot what's the big deal? How many of those balls in life did mean something to someone else or even to you in the long run? Do you let all the balls go by and never get around to hitting one before your time is up?
Fine, my teammates, snort and shake your head in disbelief if you wish at my antics and although I left on that court some skin, some blood and cotton fabric, I walked away with some much more important. I practice with a character trait that I hope I have embedded everytime I play a shot in this little game of life.