Yesterday

Yesterday

Yesterday was an interesting day for me. It began with a table tennis match between Michael, my gardener and car-washer, and me. We have been playing a while, and he has gotten steadily better; he is now a very good player and has even beaten me on one occasion. It was extremely close yesterday, though I emerged the winner at 8 games to 3. But who was the winner is immaterial; the excellence of the play is the point. We competed, yes, but we also cooperated, by bringing out the best in each other. It could have gone either way. There was exhilaration in the air—the joy of skill. He has a formidable serve, and I needed to return it aggressively on the backhand with a sharp upward motion. We will be playing again next week. Then I took care of some academic stuff (boring!).

I had a one o’clock appointment at the hospital to see my surgeon of three years ago, Dr. Civantos. It was a yearly follow-up appointment, and the doctor declared me in the clear as far as he was concerned, joyfully discharging me. A nice meeting, delightful man. I had a tennis game arranged with my friend Eddy at 4pm. Here is the amazing thing: it was clearly the best tennis game I have ever played in my life, and I even won a game against him (11-8). Eddy is an excellent player, and I rarely take a game from him. But again, who won is not the point: he enabled me to play the best tennis of my life at 76. We have played over a thousand times together over a twelve-year period, so he knows my game—and he agreed it was my best game ever. Remember that my neck surgery nearly put paid to my tennis life, and it took me three years to recover to this point. I wonder whether my recent writing about skill played a part in my rejuvenation.

But that wasn’t quite all yesterday. At home I practiced my singing for twenty minutes and lo and behold, miraculously, magically, my voice found a new register—more forceful, more supple, more soulful (if I may say so). I was genuinely surprised at what was coming out of my mouth. Songs I had sung a thousand times sounded more vibrant, more resonant. This Boy had acquired new depth. Baby I Love You shook the rafters. Hanky Panky really rocked. Then, later, I watched Abby Phillip on CNN while playing the guitar (nothing special here but okay). She was her usual impressive self: hugely pregnant, penetrating, polite, beautiful through and through. I thought: not a bad way to spend a day.