This emotionality is unseemly
A measured motion governs man. (Archilochus)
It’s been exactly twelve days since the first Grand Slam tournament of the year ended. Twelve long days. But who’s counting?
I had just nestled into my seat, mentally and emotionally prepared for a ten-hour flight, the airplane had just begun its nerve-wrecking droning sound when a familiar feeling hit me. One I thought I had left behind with my retirement from professional tennis. It was a whiff of sadness, just a tinge, a light shade at the periphery of my vision. I looked around hoping to catch a clearer picture, maybe understand why I felt sad when there was nothing, absolutely nothing, to be sad about and then suddenly I recognized it. It was the feeling of emptiness after a big tournament ends. All your hopes and wishes, desires and dreams, come to a halt. Whether they have been fulfilled or not doesn’t really matter. It’s over and that’s the sad part. The Australian Open: done and dusted. The adrenaline run dry.
Even the victorious ones feel it albeit delayed. Maybe they feel it more intensely. I wouldn’t know. I never won a Major. But I have won a few good ol’ “regular” titles and the emptiness never failed to meet me, tackle me even like Travis Kelce tackles his opponents.
The sadness after a Grand Slam tournament ends, however, is the one that stings most, that feels more profound.
When I retired one of the (many) things I went through was the transformation from player to audience member. I still loved the game when I bid farewell and I kept that love within me when my thoughts started shifting from training and playing to settling into a new reality. A new reality with many novelties, one of them being catapulted to the outside of the tennis world looking in as opposed to being inside it looking out. The sadness after a Major tournament ends was softened, the sharp needles losing its poignancy, but it nevertheless remained as an echo of something once felt.
In coming posts, I will talk more about the transition from player to audience member, from professional to civilian (among other things), but for now I want to focus on the observer’s perspective. Because that’s what I’ve been for the past five Majors and it’s part of the new reality I’m settling in. And shockingly, the difference it makes is marginal.
It still becomes the all-encompassing structure of my daily life, the thing I adjust my sleep schedule to, the protagonists my substitute friends and family members for a brief period of time. I become attached to some of them like to that one boyfriend or girlfriend you secretly know is bad for you.
But this time around it’s the right kind of important. It’s important enough that it could change any given player’s life. The stakes are real not imagined. But it’s not important enough to change my life. Not anymore. It’s safe-important. Important enough for it to justify me not sleeping more than four hours a night for two weeks. Not important enough to feel dangerous. Safe-important. Is it better this way? I don’t have an answer (yet).
And yes, there are other tournaments after a Grand Slam ends. The tour keeps touring. But doesn’t it feel like a nicotine patch when all you want is a big puff of a real terribly unhealthy cigarette? Like a decaf cup when all you need is strong black coffee, the kind that makes you feel uneasy rather than awake?
I miss them already.
I miss the grand master Daniil Medvedev with his crooked smile and weird shock of hair who plays tennis like it’s a game of chess, anticipating, calculating, creating angles mathematicians should study in class, who makes his opponents painfully aware of how big a tennis court can be.
I miss Gucci-model and parmesan brand ambassador Jannik Sinner who keeps the ancestry of legendary ginger haired men at the Australian Open alive (I’m looking at you, Jim Courier) and unleashes ravaging power from a bony body catching it all with skiing trained legs.
I miss Zheng Qinwen’s swag and her poise under pressure. The way she wears her hair in a robust bun and slides on hard courts and the fact that she loves karaoke.
And of course, I miss Aryna Sabalenka. The epitome of a mad woman in the best possible way. She has fallen under the spell of this sport, is crazy for it just as the rest of us. That’s where the similarities end. Because we are not Aryna Sabalenka. We could never be. But for a fortnight or so, we might just feel like we can.
I miss them and all the others that make a Major tournament a Major tournament.
The lights and big courts. The night sessions. The 11 am match when the court is too bright to see the ball. The one hot day when an Australian broadcaster will without fail fry an egg on court. The one rainy day when they make the ball kids dry the courts with towels. Surely there must be a better way? The dramatic day when all things happen at once (hello day 5!) always followed by a boring one. The way the camera zooms in on the clock keeping track of length of play as it changes from 1:59 to 2:00 hours, from 2:59 to 3:00 hours and so on…
But contrary to the boyfriend or girlfriend you secretly know is bad for you, all of the above will be back. Just 97 days to go. But who’s counting?
Things that make me happy:
Gillian Orr’s newsletter “Slouching Towards Bethnal Green”. First of all: brilliant title. It could end here because all I need is a good title to convince me but in addition Gillian’s writing is smart and funny. Something we all need more of in life. Reading her blog gave me the final push to get over myself and start this already. I also kind of stole this last section from her hoping she’ll forgive me over a pint. Find her here:
Things that make me unhappy:
The coaching split between Holger Rune und Boris Becker. I don’t know, it just felt like they were right for each other. Two rebels at heart, two perfect pairs of legs uniting. I get it, not exactly what makes a couple. But others have survived on less. They could have been Romeo and Juliet before it all went south. Oh well, I guess it all went south.
Thank you for indulging me, I will see you all next week.
Yours truly, Andrea
Loved this and you are, of course, forgiven! Looking forward to the next one.
What a wonderful beginning to write of the emotions of the AO ending. Than you for sharing with us.