In a Prison of My Own Errors

Sets 26-27 (of 365)

Stuart vs. K. at Northwest Park. Winner: K. 6-2, 6-3

My Mojo: Average, Improving Slightly Toward the End.

After a day of rest where I stayed home from work because I felt so crappy, I woke up this morning feeling decidedly better, and made it into work. It rained most of the day so I was afraid I was not going to be able to play. Then I saw an email from C., who I had originally been scheduled to play with, saying he had to cancel because he had to attend another function. I figured I would see if I could find another opponent to play tonight.

The first person I emailed was K., who readily accepted, but was wary because of the weather. I checked online and it looked like the rain would clear up by mid-afternoon. So I told K. that we could probably play, but if it still looked like rain, I would give him a call and we'd decide fom there. Fair enough.

It did clear up pretty nicely and it was just about perfect tennis weather by the evening when we were due to play. Two of the courts were just about completely dry, but they were taken. We settled for a court that only had one puddle right behind the baseline on deuce court. We played a couple of games, and then switched to a dry court when the people who were playing on it left.

K. was not a really hard hitter most of the time, but he was devastatingly consistent. Also, when he came to net, he placed his shots very well. Throughout the match, most of my money shots were not coming in for me. My lobs were falling just a little long. The winners that usually whizzed over the net hit the ribbon. My long shots fell just a tiny bit long or wide. It was really frustrating me. Even though I tried mixing it up a lot, I couldn't find a formula. And when I tried to run to a lot of his wide shots, I came just short and either flubbed them or hit weak returns that he was able to capitalize on.

Every once in a while, I was able to pull him wide and then hit zingers to the other side of the court. But I didn't do this enough to get any kind of advantage. I did have two things going for me, though. First, I had really good stamina. I was holding up well to the running on the court; I could have immediately played another match. Second,I was running him around the court a lot. But he was really getting to most of the shots, and returning them amazingly. Where my shots hit just outside, his hit just inside. Where my shots slammed into the top of the net, his glided just over.

So my shot mojo was below-average, but my stamina mojo was above-average, so I'd say it congealed together to make an average mojo. I think toward the end of the second set, I started getting just a little bit better shot mojo. I brought it up from 5-1 to 5-3. 5-4, I think, would have given me a psychological advantage that could have possibly taken me to an attitude that could win the set. And I was definitely ready to play a third if necessary. But I just couldn't get there. My very last shot was an attempt at a lob that fell so pathethically short that I just laughed and said, "Oh, shit!" while it was still way up in the air. He came up to the net, set himself up perfectly, and slammed the ball with a perfect overhead after it bounced just on the other side of the net. The placement was great, and there was no way I could get to it, I just helplessly watched it whizz by. It was a fitting way to end this match in which I was imprisoned by my own errors.

I'd like to try to get to around a total of 40 sets by the end of the year, if possible. That means about seven more matches (about 14 more sets, so maybe less matches if they go three sets or I can get some of my opponents to play longer), but there may be some rain coming up that could interfere with those plans. Plus, everybody is going to be busy with the holidays, so I may have trouble finding opponents. I just hope I can keep free of injuries also. I don't think the full insanity of trying to play this many matches has quite hit me yet. As my opponent said tonight, maybe around next June I'll start having second thoughts...