A friend sent me this photo from our high school year book. Yes, that's me on the tennis team. That's our history teacher, coaching the tennis team. He was not really a coach of any kind, but it was the best we could do. We did not have uniforms either, and other than two of the girls who grew up in better financial circumstances, none of us had ever even had tennis lessons. Some were saved by a modicum of natural ability. I was not. Any skill I possessed at tennis was achieved by hitting a tennis ball against a garage door from the time I was about seven years old. That is the year I discovered professional tennis and became a great admirer of Arthur Ashe. You can read about him
here. He was a pretty amazing person. I had nothing going for me, really, except a lot of enthusiasm. In the end, this did not win me any tennis matches, but I was undeterred because I always had fun, and I never cared all that much about winning. And so it is with most of the sports or exercise related activities I've done in my life. I have always been very enthusiastic about doing something physical--hiking, biking, martial arts, running, step aerobics, hula-hooping, kick boxing, you name it, I love to do it. Right now, at nearly 50 years old, I am studying to be a certified personal trainer. I don't know what, exactly, I'm going to do with this certification, and who will want to be trained by a middle aged computer programmer anyway? But I have one thing going for me and that is that I am enthusiastic. Maybe enthusiasm will carry the day.
A friend sent me this photo from our high school year book. Yes, that's me on the tennis team. That's our history teacher, coaching the tennis team. He was not really a coach of any kind, but it was the best we could do. We did not have uniforms either, and other than two of the girls who grew up in better financial circumstances, none of us had ever even had tennis lessons. Some were saved by a modicum of natural ability. I was not. Any skill I possessed at tennis was achieved by hitting a tennis ball against a garage door from the time I was about seven years old. That is the year I discovered professional tennis and became a great admirer of Arthur Ashe. You can read about him here. He was a pretty amazing person. I had nothing going for me, really, except a lot of enthusiasm. In the end, this did not win me any tennis matches, but I was undeterred because I always had fun, and I never cared all that much about winning. And so it is with most of the sports or exercise related activities I've done in my life. I have always been very enthusiastic about doing something physical--hiking, biking, martial arts, running, step aerobics, hula-hooping, kick boxing, you name it, I love to do it. Right now, at nearly 50 years old, I am studying to be a certified personal trainer. I don't know what, exactly, I'm going to do with this certification, and who will want to be trained by a middle aged computer programmer anyway? But I have one thing going for me and that is that I am enthusiastic. Maybe enthusiasm will carry the day.
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