Dear Marmite
As I write this, I am watching the weather outside take a turn for the worse and I am dressed and ready for a tennis match. I really should have learnt from my experience of last weekend when I played a mixed doubles in less than ideal conditions. Why couldn't it have been like the weather in this picture?
On the day in question, it was refreshingly nippy to start and there was more than a light breeze whipping across the court too. Not long after the match started driving rain interrupted play and then when we got back on court hail pounded us. If this wasn't bad enough; at one end we looked straight into blindingly low sun. My partner joked that all we needed now was a rainbow; and hey presto!! one appeared.
Playing tennis in conditions like this isn't tennis. It is not the sort of tennis that you used to watch me play from the comfortable bench at DFE. I toss the ball to serve and it moves two feet to the left before I can swing at it. From one end everything is wind assisted and from the other you have to whack the ball just to get it to pop over the net. I need lessons in taking advantage of these conditions. Better still, I should refuse to play. At least swimming lengths is not weather dependent.
I got home from the match and started to cramp up. I am good at getting cramp. I have suffered all my life and when I told Danielle about my suffering after the match she recalled a brief history of all the places I have ever had cramp. This is true. I do get it really badly. She might have shown some sympathy for my plight.
Anyway, back to my suffering. After over four hours of tennis. I couldn't get off the sofa and stand up. I rubbed one bit of cramp away only to get it somewhere else. I actually couldn't stand straight. I went to bed but couldn't sleep. One little twitch of the toes and my whole leg would seize up. OUCH!
The next morning I decided I would just swim without doing flippers and paddles. 1500m no problem! Then I got out of the water and it all started again. I couldn't stand up. I was rolling on the side of the pool, beached! I had cramp in both legs and my stomach.
Three fellow swimmers helped me while the the life guard sat on his perch and failed to notice my little crisis. Thank God I wasn't drowning! The big lesson here is - don't expect life guards to save you! They are there for show, and in this case, not to enhance the look of the place!
I realise that I am repeating my past mistakes - overdoing things and then getting cramp for starters and then agreeing to play matches in winter. Repeat after me Marms, I must not...
Actually there is a very long list of - I must nots... As they say, one is never too old to learn - or, is it that you can't teach an old dog new tricks! I am a work in progress, even at my age!
Love You!!
XXX
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