Brainstorm: Summer 2020
The Near-Perfection of Normalcy
I hadn’t stepped foot in my local fitness club since the middle of March.
As a bit of a gym rat (okay, I confess, I go twice per week, so maybe I’m more of a “gym hamster”), I truly missed the atmosphere of so many adults desperately trying so hard to keep the effects of aging at bay. I finally went back last week, wearing my mask, spritzing each and every machine, bar, mat, fit ball, etc. with the magical elixir that hangs next to each and every apparatus. I wanted it to be normal, just with a few extra precautions. And it was normal…ish. But it was also simultaneously foreign. And yucky.
Wearing a mask in general is mildly inconvenient, and sometimes unpleasant. Wearing a mask to work out is like voluntarily experiencing some measure of waterboarding, especially when you sweat as much as I do. With each deep breath in, I inhaled my workout-specific mask as well, mixing silver microparticle threading – with its many antimicrobial properties – along with recycled air and a fair dosage of perspiration.
It wasn’t as ghastly as the movies make it seem, but I feel fairly certain that in the hands of a more skilled practitioner, this method of torture would be quite frightening.
But I was back in the club, and it was good to be there.
Early in the pandemic, I had rediscovered my joy of running, until a torn meniscus in April ended that practice. I got on my bike, but inconsistent weather and a painful knee sidelined me until I could finally repair the injury and start my rehab. That was in June.
Last week, I finally got clearance from my surgeon to start playing tennis again, which I must admit was a far better experience than lifting weights at the club. No masks, no spray-on germ killer and no tape on the floor demarcating a six-foot droplet-free zone.
Outside, in the fresh air, exchanging banter with friends and family across the net, feeling the crisp pop in the strings and straining my eyes against an impossibly blue Colorado sky…. That’s not just normal, it’s perfect. It was about the only normal activity I’ve found outside the house.
Maybe that’s why so many new players are giving tennis a go. With the possible exception of the post-match handshake or chest bump, tennis is what it has always been – a socially distant social experience. So while so many youth sports are desperately trying to find a way to return to action with limited success, tennis is still being played, as it has always been.
It’s being played in public parks, in leafy suburbs and on high school courts across the state. In fact, high school tennis teams are seeing a big increase in interest as many athletes are scrambling to find opportunities to play school sports now that their chosen sports are getting postponed. It’s both a good and a bad problem to have, because restrictions on facilities make it hard to accommodate all the interest. Youth and adult programs have seen a combination of pent up demand and a surge of “samplers”.
As we look ahead to more normal days, when youth sports are allowed to resume and mask usage is no longer mandated, perhaps there is some cause for optimism. Maybe the current postponement of team sports and other activities will lead to a new tennis boom in younger generations, or perhaps the case for a BOOM may be, pardon the expression, a bit overblown. But even if the effects of the pandemic shutdown don’t predict a massive tennis participation explosion, the number of youth and adult players willing to return to the courts feels like a huge win for normalcy.
As of today, tennis is but one of a handful of approved sports that our communities are embracing. That is good news, not just for today, but for the future. The more people who sample the sport during these abnormal times will likely translate to bigger numbers in the future.
And for those of us who have already made the return to tennis, normal isn’t bland. And it’s definitely not mundane. It’s deeply refreshing, especially when you’re surrounded by friends, and you take a deep breath and look up into a beautiful Colorado blue sky. Normal is, as close as I can tell, just about perfect.
Kurt Desautels
Editor, Colorado Tennis magazine
Summer 2020
