Unwilling Self-Negation
My Mother is fortune; My Father generosity and bounty; I am joy, son of joy, son of joy, son of joy… - Maulana Rumi
Sampras Salute
January 29, 2006
I grew up playing tennis. Hitting balls against minivans with wooden rackets in third world countries. Sneaking out at six in the desert mornings of Arizona to play with the senior 70+ crowd because they were willing to pay for courts. High school tennis with crushing six hour trips during which college applications were filled and where college recruiters were spoken to, and then recreationally from there on (I decided not to play at college). Through my love of the game (to which I will make a tribute some other day), I became a fan of the great Pete Sampras. From 1990 to 2002, I believe that I watched every single quarter-final, semi-final and final Sampras played in (which was televised). Not only that, but I taped most of these and spent hundreds of hours replying those matches. Such was my obsession that my younger brother could recite most of the commentary made on those matches by John McEnroe and Dick Enberg of NBC. Those were twelve happy years.
Since 2002 I have not watched a single grand slam match. I have watched a few matches here and there — most notably Agassi’s last year run at the U.S. Open final. Aside from that I now watch women’s tennis. The cause for all of this? Two words: Roger Federer. Who has just won his seventh grand slam title in Australia and third straight grand slam final. The last person to win three straight slams was, you guessed it, Pete Sampras. To be very direct, I hate Roger Federer.
I shouldn’t, though. Sampras, shortly before retiring (and losing to Federer at Wimbledon), said that Federer was the next Sampras. Federer’s certainly turned out to be that. At the age of 24, Federer is already half-way to Sampras’ 14 slam title. This fact, more than any other, causes me chagrin. Simply put, I do not want the immensity of Sampras’ accomplishment matched or threatened. This has very little to do with how much (or how little — very little) I care about Roger Federer (these guys like him). To me, Roger could be anyone. A cute red-fez wearing monkey. Zeus. Doesn’t matter. My dislike has everything to do with the iconic status I attributed to Sampras; the enthronement of his accomplishment in my mind; my unwillingness to accept that anyone might equal it.
Sampras was, in very uncertain times of my life, the only certainty. Even when everything seemed to point to the fact that he would simply flicker and disappear like the stolen cable on which I watched him, he remained. When I looked around me and saw no familiar faces after having left yet another home behind, I could turn on the television and find him, dolphin snout down, walking one end of the court to another, adjusting strings as Santana does the guitar, crouching down, hitting a shot, straightening up, switching sides, hitting, and winning. Repeat. He showed up when he had no right to be there. Sometimes you saw him stuffed into the backhand side, his singular weakness exposed, his opponent ready to hit one cross court, so at four in the morning you yelled at the television, “cover the damn forehand!” and somehwere in Australia he heard you, and managed to get across the lines, hitting the patented running forehand; a flash on the screen; a winner. He was there when he had no reason to be. When he hit aces in the Melbourne night, with tears streaming down his face because he found out during the match that his best friend had cancer. When he grew ill on the court in the New York night and then hit second serve aces against Corretja to seal that memorable quarter final. When you saw him struggling at Wimbledon and he needed notes from his wife to get him out of his seat. When, year after despicable year, he faltered in the red sands of Roland Garros in Paris, broken and defeated at the hands of midget tricksters and an unforgiving surface. Everything changed; nothing remained the same; sometimes it was a blizzard outside, and sometimes it was loneliness inside, but somewhere there was Sampras, managing to get through his tribulation. Yet, the whole time, I was not even aware that he had thalassemia. In other words, he existed for me, lived for me, won for me — all to assure me that in the upheavels of life some things were certain and unchanging. He did this all without ever exposing his own weakness.
I never got to see him. I had my chances but I always declined. I knew that if I saw him it might shake the aura of permanence I had given to him. My mortal eye might spy mortality . His farewell ceremony I could not watch because I have not yet accepted the fact that he is gone. I broke off relations with people who in passing compared something about me to Pete Sampras’ attributes – because I didn’t like the idea of competing with him. You don’t compete with permanence. You always lose. That was the best thing about Sampras; that he was an unabashed winner. In the singular most individual game of the modern era, he stands singularly alone at the top. (Give it a second to load). Not only that, but that he accomplished so much by being nothing more than what he was at the age of forteen. Tennis technology changed and improved but he stuck to his kevlar Wilson racket from 1984, strung at obscenely high tension. The era of the serve and volleyer ended, but he just kept coming at the net because that’s how he played as a kid. He never permitted his parents to come to his matches and they never did (save once). If someone hit a winner off his serve, he served to them at the same place again.
Permanence. Someone once asked me if I would slice off with a sword the head of the person I most love in the world to become permanent. Most people answer no, because they have never felt the grandeur of permanence in their life.
Most people haven’t seen Pete Sampras.
My Mother is fortune; My Father generosity and bounty; I am joy, son of joy, son of joy, son of joy… - Maulana Rumi
Sampras Salute
January 29, 2006
I grew up playing tennis. Hitting balls against minivans with wooden rackets in third world countries. Sneaking out at six in the desert mornings of Arizona to play with the senior 70+ crowd because they were willing to pay for courts. High school tennis with crushing six hour trips during which college applications were filled and where college recruiters were spoken to, and then recreationally from there on (I decided not to play at college). Through my love of the game (to which I will make a tribute some other day), I became a fan of the great Pete Sampras. From 1990 to 2002, I believe that I watched every single quarter-final, semi-final and final Sampras played in (which was televised). Not only that, but I taped most of these and spent hundreds of hours replying those matches. Such was my obsession that my younger brother could recite most of the commentary made on those matches by John McEnroe and Dick Enberg of NBC. Those were twelve happy years.
Since 2002 I have not watched a single grand slam match. I have watched a few matches here and there — most notably Agassi’s last year run at the U.S. Open final. Aside from that I now watch women’s tennis. The cause for all of this? Two words: Roger Federer. Who has just won his seventh grand slam title in Australia and third straight grand slam final. The last person to win three straight slams was, you guessed it, Pete Sampras. To be very direct, I hate Roger Federer.
I shouldn’t, though. Sampras, shortly before retiring (and losing to Federer at Wimbledon), said that Federer was the next Sampras. Federer’s certainly turned out to be that. At the age of 24, Federer is already half-way to Sampras’ 14 slam title. This fact, more than any other, causes me chagrin. Simply put, I do not want the immensity of Sampras’ accomplishment matched or threatened. This has very little to do with how much (or how little — very little) I care about Roger Federer (these guys like him). To me, Roger could be anyone. A cute red-fez wearing monkey. Zeus. Doesn’t matter. My dislike has everything to do with the iconic status I attributed to Sampras; the enthronement of his accomplishment in my mind; my unwillingness to accept that anyone might equal it.
Sampras was, in very uncertain times of my life, the only certainty. Even when everything seemed to point to the fact that he would simply flicker and disappear like the stolen cable on which I watched him, he remained. When I looked around me and saw no familiar faces after having left yet another home behind, I could turn on the television and find him, dolphin snout down, walking one end of the court to another, adjusting strings as Santana does the guitar, crouching down, hitting a shot, straightening up, switching sides, hitting, and winning. Repeat. He showed up when he had no right to be there. Sometimes you saw him stuffed into the backhand side, his singular weakness exposed, his opponent ready to hit one cross court, so at four in the morning you yelled at the television, “cover the damn forehand!” and somehwere in Australia he heard you, and managed to get across the lines, hitting the patented running forehand; a flash on the screen; a winner. He was there when he had no reason to be. When he hit aces in the Melbourne night, with tears streaming down his face because he found out during the match that his best friend had cancer. When he grew ill on the court in the New York night and then hit second serve aces against Corretja to seal that memorable quarter final. When you saw him struggling at Wimbledon and he needed notes from his wife to get him out of his seat. When, year after despicable year, he faltered in the red sands of Roland Garros in Paris, broken and defeated at the hands of midget tricksters and an unforgiving surface. Everything changed; nothing remained the same; sometimes it was a blizzard outside, and sometimes it was loneliness inside, but somewhere there was Sampras, managing to get through his tribulation. Yet, the whole time, I was not even aware that he had thalassemia. In other words, he existed for me, lived for me, won for me — all to assure me that in the upheavels of life some things were certain and unchanging. He did this all without ever exposing his own weakness.
I never got to see him. I had my chances but I always declined. I knew that if I saw him it might shake the aura of permanence I had given to him. My mortal eye might spy mortality . His farewell ceremony I could not watch because I have not yet accepted the fact that he is gone. I broke off relations with people who in passing compared something about me to Pete Sampras’ attributes – because I didn’t like the idea of competing with him. You don’t compete with permanence. You always lose. That was the best thing about Sampras; that he was an unabashed winner. In the singular most individual game of the modern era, he stands singularly alone at the top. (Give it a second to load). Not only that, but that he accomplished so much by being nothing more than what he was at the age of forteen. Tennis technology changed and improved but he stuck to his kevlar Wilson racket from 1984, strung at obscenely high tension. The era of the serve and volleyer ended, but he just kept coming at the net because that’s how he played as a kid. He never permitted his parents to come to his matches and they never did (save once). If someone hit a winner off his serve, he served to them at the same place again.
Permanence. Someone once asked me if I would slice off with a sword the head of the person I most love in the world to become permanent. Most people answer no, because they have never felt the grandeur of permanence in their life.
Most people haven’t seen Pete Sampras.