TENNIS ANYONE?
Tennis is a popular game here. While I personally do not play, I can understand why it’s popular. Due to our mild winter climate it’s possible to play all year long.
To me, tennis is a monotonous sport. One player hits a ball and the other tries hitting it back. When one person misses or it goes out of bounds, the other player scores a point. The whole game consists of a series of strokes where each player hits the ball and tries returning it. The game goes back and forth, forth and back. That’s it. Nothing more.
Games can be short if one player simply dominates or a player screws up shot after shot. Then again, games can go on for a long time; seemingly ad infinitum if both successfully return the ball over and over and over again.
There is excitement if one or both players make spectacular shots. But, most of the game bounces from one side to the other hypnotically. In a way, the action sort of resembles watching a horizontal yoyo looping from left to right, then right to left, on and on.
To add another layer of skill, the ball must clear a low net on each pass. And, the space on which the playing surface resides is limited. A tennis court has lines of demarcation clearly showing what is in and out of bounds. Without the keen eye of a referee, it can be challenging to maintain absolute assurance neither player violates these lines. Of course, even referees make mistakes. There are no absolutes.
Mostly, I imagine, they stick to the rules, but occasionally there are infractions. Sometimes the offending party admits it, sometimes not. Sometimes the guilty party gets caught, but not always. Players just muddle through as best they can with the conditions they have to work with.
Tennis has a specialized scoring system. The first point scores at 15. The second point scores at 30. The third at 40 and the last point is simply called “game.” Hence, there are four points, unless there’s a tie at 40-40, or “40 all” as they say. A tie at that point is “deuce” and the only way a player can win the game is by scoring two consecutive points.
I’m sure there’s a reason they don’t count points 1, 2, 3, and 4, but I don’t know what it is. It seems every game complicates its scoring with specialized nomenclature and you can’t play effectively if you don’t know the vocabulary. If a player has no points, they don’t have zero, they have “love.” Perhaps it’s a reference to the Beatles song “All You Need Is Love.” I guess if you have no points, you still have love. Anything beyond “love” is a bonus!
Hey! Tennis is lot like life. Tedium defines much of life with occasional bursts of excitement. Most people play fairly, but falter from time to time, sometimes intentionally. Occasionally they fess up, but at other times they slide by, unless caught. Life, like tennis, proceeds smoothly when played with integrity.
Life is a popular game here. I play all year around, regardless of the climate.
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