My zen-like, out-of-body experience at a girls tennis match

We just came off of hell week at our paper. A man down due to a vacation approved by some dumb ass SE, best laid plans blew up like Hiroshima when we had rain during the week. As a result, I had to fill in and cover a playoff girls tennis match, or regional in the parlance of my state. First time in nearly a decade I've covered the sport.

I respect tennis, but it bores the shit out of me, and my match wasn't even competitive, the team I covered won 5-0. Anyone who's covered this sport knows that even a 5-0 blowout doesn't necessarily equate to a quick day. Sure enough, No. 3 singles dragged on long past the other four matches.

So I'm standing there, sunglasses on, leaning against a pole waiting for this match to meet its merciful end, while trying not to look like one of the middle-aged pervs that girls tennis draws like a magnet. Well at first anyway. Then I saw the humor in it, and unbuttoned one more button on my polo shirt. (kidding, kidding).

The guy next to me, who resembled a down-home version of former open-wheel driver Eddie Cheever, was the father of the girl on the team I wasn't covering. She was getting beat, but he was totally into it.

That's when I had my out-of-body experience/epiphany. I floated out of my body, but so did tennis dad. I'll relay it as best I can ...

Tennis dad: Who are you? And why is your shirt unbuttoned?
Bubbler: I'm Bubbler. I'm a sportswr ...
Tennis dad: Whoa! Did you see my girl's backhand? (real voice) Keep going honey! Remember what your Martina Hingis DVD told you! (real voice) So, I don't see a camera on you, you taking pictures?
Bubbler: Never. I'm not sure why I'm here, by that I mean, why we're conversing in the telepathic ether, but I have something important to tell you.
Tennis dad: Can you tell me later, it's 40-Love.
Bubbler: I'm not going to lie, I want your daughter to lose. The quicker the better.
Tennis dad: That's nice. You got a kid on the team or something? I thought sportswriters were supposed to be down the middle?
Bubbler: Oh I am. I bear no animus towards your daughter, I don't even care who wins, but here's how it is, I'm hungry and I'm on deadline. The quicker your daughter loses, the quicker I file, and the quicker I eat.
Tennis dad: So?
Bubbler: So don't you see how amazing that is on a zen level? To me, the existence of your daughter basically boils down to getting a buffalo wing 45 minutes earlier than I would otherwise. When I see your daughter playing tennis, I don't see tennis, it's like one of those old cartoons, I see a buffalo wing with a tennis racket in her hand. A buffalo wing that better not force a third set.
Tennis dad: Fuck you, asshole. Why are you telling me this?
Bubbler: I just find the whole dichotomy fascinating. From your perspective, for all I know, her whole life is riding on this match. I mean, you've seen her love of tennis bubble up from the beginning. Maybe there was some touching moment where you handed her your tennis racket and she immediately developed a love for the sport. You were there for the tennis lessons, when she mastered her serve, when she developed some spin on her return smash, when she became comfortable at the net. This regional is the culmination of a dream.
Meanwhile, I've never seen your daughter before, and likely, will never see her again. From my standpoint, she was born and put on this Earth specifically to determine whether I eat a buffalo wing 45 or 90 minutes from now.
I find that amazing.
Tennis dad: I find that you're a selfish asshole. I ought to kick your motherfucking ass when I float back in my body.
Bubbler: Stop right there. Yes, I'm a selfish jerk, but at least my selfishness has a certain neutrality to it. Believe me, if your daughter was winning, I'd be cheering her on for my buffalo wings.
But take a look at yourself and ask who's being selfish?
Tennis dad: You said my daughter is a buffalo wing and I'm selfish? That's rich, jerk off.
Bubbler: Have you noticed what happens everytime you cheer for your daughter? It's a call-and-response ritual. When you cheer, it elicits a counter-cheer from one of the girls on the other team. You see, all of the dreams you have for your daughter, counter directly with the dreams of her opponent. At least my selfishness is neutral.
Your daughter's success depends on the other player's failure. In other words, that other player was born specifically to have her own tennis dreams crushed under foot by your daughter, or in the case of this match, the other way around because she's kicking your daughter's ass at present.
Tennis dad: I never thought of it that way. I guess we're all selfish in that sense. Everything around us exists for our whims, our outlook on life. That pole you're leaning on, for example, from your standpoint, it exists so you can have something to lean, and to play up this middle-aged perv thing you've got going. I get what you're saying.
Bubbler: Exactly.
Tennis dad: I still think you're an asshole. But I hope you enjoy your buffalo wing. For me, you apparently exist to point this zen-like situation out to me.
Bubbler: Apparently.
Tennis dad: Fuck you. And fuck you twice for not having a photographer here.

 

Hahahahahahaha. Fucking hilarious.

 

That was genius. Pure genius.

 

Which girl tried hardest?

 

they all tried hard, slap. Even the JV's.

 

ESPECIALLY the JVs...

 

The bitch of it was the buffalo wings I had were really sub-standard.

 

THAT'S the funniest post.

 

Think about this, Bubs.

Ten years from now, you'll be rooting for New Brittney to lose a tennis match, so you can haul ass to go get some wings, which will be served to you by Little Miss Brittneigh, whose loss in the tennis regional began a downward spiral in her life which would ultimately culminate in her taking a job at a Hooters within driving distance of the same tennis courts where you gleefully wished for her defeat.

The moral of the story?

Tip the waitress. Even if the wings suck.

 

That's fucking funny.

 

Could be.

A more likely scenario is that I get laid off by my paper, I have to take a job at Buffalo Wild Wings, and 10 years later, she brings the team she coaches in for a post-meal dinner.

Tip the waiter, indeed!

 

www.wikipedia.com/heat_stroke