Q: I regularly hit with a very tedious person who always has an excuse for how they play. (They play fine, for the record, and I enjoy hitting with them.) Naturally, their stream of excuses is irritating. Sometimes it’s their grip. Other times they’re not feeling well. Once it was because they ATE A BANANA when they usually don’t eat a banana before playing! How do I encourage this person to just… hit without annotating their performance all the time?
Dear Sound Bored,
This shall be your name, for life as your hitting partner’s sound board certainly does sound boring. I wonder for how long you have resisted a catty retort? You must be a better wo(man) than I.
When my now-husband and I were getting to know each other, he insisted I teach him to play tennis. That first day, as I led my fledgling to the nearest NYC Parks wall, I had concerns. Tennis, as you know, looks majestic from the outside but once inside, it can quickly fracture your ego. He was not going to immediately *get it*. Would he be petulant? Arrogant? Was I ready to diffuse the emotions of a crestfallen tenderfoot?
As it happens, I was concerned about all the wrong things. This man, a carpenter as Jesus was, couldn’t grip the racquet from my childhood—though it is featherlight and the color of cartoonish bananas. Four fingers on his dominant hand became unceremoniously entangled in a table saw years earlier, if you must know. I am told each of them dangled limply for a time before being sewn back on. Naturally, the fingers don’t bend as they should. This is going to be a problem, I thought. But a problem it wasn’t: This unbothered sonofabitch just started hitting balls with his left hand. Not only was he not astonishingly bad—owed to a history of soccer excellence, probably—he was receptive to my feedback. He did not exhibit arrogance. Today, he beats me from time to time, even though I started playing in the 90s. I say this not to moan like your doleful hitting partner, or to gloat about how I picked a deft and resourceful person to marry (I did), but to provide an example of what a real tennis impediment looks like.
Because, hear me out. WHAT ABOUT if every time your hitting partner made a dum-dum excuse, you—instead of engaging—deployed some trivia about tennis players overcoming mountainous obstacles? Relatively speaking, they might be moved to take a long, hard look in the mirror. You will be effusive and enlightening and never cruel. You will be a fountain of factoids. There will be a twinkle in your eye. Let’s practice:
Hitting partner (HP): My word I am terrible today! Guessing it’s this new hair tie / Gatorade flavor I’m trying.
Sound Bored (SB): Say, do you remember that time Simona Halep got a breast reduction?
At this point they may look at you as if your very head is a breast. As if to say, how is this relevant? But stay the course. Paint with all the colors of the wind.
“Yes,” you will say, “She was a 34DD which is quite the pair for a slim woman of 5 '6! She said they really weighed her down. But then, after her reduction, she started winning more matches. One person’s treasure is another’s trash, I guess!” At this point you are gesticulating or at least moving your eyebrows in new and exciting ways.
The Halep folklore will backfire only if your friend happens to be a large-breasted woman, in which case you’ve fattened up her folder of excuses. Let’s keep practising our lines.
HP: Have you ever seen me play so bad? I think melatonin is making me groggy.
SB: Speaking of adversity! Karolina Muchova somehow won her second-round match at the 2025 US Open despite her feral ex-boyfriend—a seasoned troll with a history of “showing up at places where he shouldn't be”—buying a seat directly opposite her bench! Can you IMAGINE? She was seen crying on court before asking the ump for a brief hiatus, then returned to court to win the match. Anyway I wonder if she takes melatonin. (Jk, don’t say the last bit—that would be snide.)
Congratulations are in order—you have just derailed another solipsistic tirade from HP. What’s more, you’ve opened double doors to an irresistible, indulgent tête-à-tête about your despicable former lovers. May you talk so much shit about these losers that the warm, meditative feelings overwrite the annoyed ones. However! You should promptly sever ties with HP if they reveal themselves as one of those people who make it a point of pride to be friends with their exes. This is performative, incorrect behavior.
Now that we have the execution dialed, here are some other topics to drive your tangential comeuppance: Carlos Alcaraz was bamboozled by bees in Indian Wells in 2024, but went on to beat Alexander Zverev. Michael Llodra accidentally hit and killed a bird with his racquet at the 2002 Australian Open, and after a short ‘wake,’ of sorts, he and his doubles partner, Fabrice Santoro, won the match. At the 1949 US Open, Pancho Gonzales beat the top seed, Frank Schroeder—who won eight of nine of their last encounters—in five sets. All the while, Gonzales had a broken nose.
Remember to always emphasize the winning. It was hard, but they succeeded. They floundered, but they overcame. One day, not so long after implementing my methods, HP will realize God gives his most minor inconveniences to his weakest soldiers. The complaints will stop. HP will find strength in silence.
