I had a marvelously humbling experience this past weekend, going to Washington D.C. and staying at the Watergate hotel while I played in a squash tournament at Squash on Fire, a reasonably new club run by my old friend David Hughes who I know from Open Squash in New York. He’s since moved to D.C. to be the executive director of this new club and hosted a tournament for visitors from New York and, er…other places. Like me.
I have been passionate about playing squash for years but since moving to Norfolk, Virginia, I haven’t been able to do it. I think I’ve finally found a way to fix the problem by applying to join the yacht club here, but that takes a few months and I’ve still got to cross my fingers, as well as sell my kidneys on the Internet to afford the initiation fee.
Meanwhile I had several games this weekend against players I’d have beaten last summer. Instead, I found my brain saying, “you should be moving over there to hit the ball, Matt,” but my legs refused to do it. I used to watch the ball moving around the court in slow motion and have plenty of time to do what I wanted. Nowadays it seems the ball moves at the speed of light and the only thing moving slowly is my mind. I used to be very good at pretending I wasn’t exhausted after a few long rallies. This past weekend, I found myself doubled over and heaving for air. It was embarrassing!
“I’m not as good at this as I used to be,” I said, to everyone who would listen.
As a middle-aged man this is an experience I have often when, for example, trying to stay up past 11 o’clock in the evening or doing anything requiring short term memory and the ability to concentrate on more than one thing at a time. In the age of AI I’m also often aware, as a writer, that my professional skills are being displaced by computers and it’s easy to question my value as a human being. But it’s rare that those feelings come into such sharp focus and as David agreed when I talked to him about it, such an experience could be “good for me.”
That said, something rather nice did come out of the weekend’s squash disasters. Two young women I knew from New York wanted to play squash with me — not something they’d have wanted to do last year, based on my rating. That they were willing to entertain a game with me showed that yes, I’m not as good as I used to be but also, that I’m not a huge jerk. Most young women won’t play with older guys because we have a reputation for insecurity and not wanting to lose. I was flattered to be assigned, however briefly, to the non-jerk category. Or perhaps they just took pity on me. They were a couple of great, enjoyable games, too. It was nice to see what happened once my ego died.
Another guy I played told me after our game that I should be “an ambassador for the sport.” He was a great player and every time he shot a ball past me or made a good choice, I found myself telling him, “great shot,” or “great choice,” and even though he beat me by about 30 points to 5, he told me he’d enjoyed playing with me and that it was refreshing to play with somebody who was “so comfortable losing.”
Never mind losing, I told him my goal for the day was to avoid going to hospital. I can’t wait to get back to a regular squash practice — like writing, it’s one of those things that sharpens up when you do it often and you can’t just assume you’ll be sharp after a long absence. Likewise, I was pleased to meet the guy who showed up on the squash court this past weekend. Not a jerk. Not even half of one.
(Pats himself on the back).
That’s growth!
