Funky-Personal Narrative

40-30, first serve, match point. As the ball reaches the apex of its trajectory, the muscles in my legs uncoil as I spring up from a crouched position to meet the ball with one fluid motion. The contact feels solid, and I watch as the magnus effect curves the fuzzy yellow ball towards the T. As my opponent reaches futilely towards the perfectly placed serve, I am rushed with excitement and happiness. And then it faded. I was now in the dark, listening to the harsh beep of the alarm clock, rubbing the sleep from my eyes, grasping for the ephemeral feeling of euphoria. It was the first saturday of the month, tournament day, my one opportunity to champ up and realize a goal that I had been pursuing ever since the beginning of my competitive playing

Brimming with anticipation and excitement, I laced up my Babolat Propulse 3’s and walked to the tournament desk with each step exuding confidence. A short wait later, I was on court. Right from the beginning of warm up, it was apparent that my opponent's strokes were not as refined as mine. In my mind, I had already won. However, as the match progressed, his strengths started to manifest; he was fast enough to get to all of my shots, and as funky as his strokes were, he was always able to get the ball over. Slowly, the illusion of a facile victory faded away as I found myself down 30-40, match point, second serve. With one more miss, the match ended on an unspectacular double fault. In shame and disappointment, my tournament was

Tennis is like an artform; there is intrinsic beauty in the elegance and grace of clean execution. The satisfaction of painting the lines with a forehand winner or hitting a drop shot that bounces more than 3 times in the service box drives my passion for the game. For me, everything has always been a struggle to get better; thinking in terms of absolutes, you are either one of the bests or you are no one. Achievement, however, is meaningless when stripped of context; without natural beauty and elegance, any record or accomplishment is essentially pointless. This extends beyond competition to other fields and activities. For example, the pleasure of solving equations in math and physics is derived from the elegance of the equations that can explain the most complex systems and behaviors. So while tennis may always be a competition, it is important to appreciate and understand the underlying beauty that gives the game