To play properly, tennis requires large quantities of hand-eye coordination, cool-looking clothing and shoes with high-tech lacing systems requiring a physics degree to fasten. Players wield futuristic sticks (rackets) made of space shuttle-grade titanium.

On a typical early Spring Saturday morning one may encounter hurricane-force winds, light drizzle and courts that only allow players to look directly into the sun. I have searched many volumes dealing with the physical sciences for an explanation of how this is possible. Combine these factors with sixteen graying, balding middle-aged men and you have your basic United States Tennis Association league match.

Two or four players will dart around a court that is twenty-seven by seventy-eight feet at the beginning of the match. By the end of the match, all players require courtside oxygen and the court dimensions have mysteriously increased to one half mile by one half mile. At this point many players have trouble remembering the score as their primary focus has shifted to simply maintaining consciousness.

For those who are able to capture the forty-eight points required to win two sets, their reward is the privilege of doing it all again next week. The survivors (there are no winners) are the ones still coherent enough to remember where they parked. The really lucky ones also remember what kind of car they drive.

There is a sign in the tunnel leading from the player's dressing room to Centre Court Wimbledon upon which hang Rudyard Kipling's immortal words:

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!

This eliminates virtually everyone I play with. We inhabit some smoky shadow land between not two, but many imposters; our primary concerns are trying to find enough Ben-Gay and baler twine to keep things patched together for another week.

The game of doubles simply complicates matters times two. The main difference between singles and doubles is that doubles is played with a "partner". "You have little or no control over this person-his mental outlook, quirks in his personality, his tendency to collapse under pressure, or his concept of tennis tactics." A good partner always tells you how great you are playing. An exceptional partner offers you a refill from his water jug if you run out during a long match.
Tennis is a game of great courtesy. Tennis is the only sport to have it's own set of unofficial rules that deal entirely with sportsmanship. Written in the late 1800's by Col. Nick Powell, The Code is still the final reference in matters of tennis etiquette. In the spirit of good sportsmanship, I leave you with a quote from tennis author Rex Lardner in response to a query from a concerned reader:

Q.: Does the winner or loser buy the drinks after the match?
A.: Your opponent does-whether he wins or loses-or there are no drinks.

Kipling, Rudyard "If" Complete Collection of Poems by Rudyard Kipling http://www.poetryloverspage.com/poets/kipling/k

Lardner, Rex The Underhanded Serve: Or How To Play Dirty Tennis New York: Hawthorne, 1968

Lardner, Rex The Underhanded Serve: Or How To Play Dirty Tennis New York: Hawthorne, 1968