THE CLAY

(June 9, 2014)

Like when love is like a roller-coaster, my heart this morning went up and down in Miami and television. And when the smoke was cleared, I felt like among the revelers swimming in South Beach in wild abandon.  But before that, I was greatly entertained too when TV enslaved me this weekend. For two successive days, things turned out as what I wished they should be again.

Two persons, both of whom I root for since the reign of ex-President Gloria, were the cause of my silent euphoria: One is the footloose, claymaster Rafael Nadal a.k.a. Rafa, and the other is the shrieking Maria Sharapova.

I really can’t understand why although I have yet to hold tennis racket since birth in actual game or practice, I have followed the game and a big fan of it since the days of Borg and Connors and Martina, the Navratilova not Hingis.

And the one player that electrified my interest was the young John McEnroe, the mercurial American whose temper was hotter than the sun if not towering inferno. Those were the days when computers and cameras had no HD’s yet in their names, thus when umpires would commit mistakes expect most players to call them names.

And McEnroe was not just calling names, or cursing or cussing, my friend. I suspect he tops the record of having so many rackets to destroy or bend. Well, I can understand his antics being a passionate player, most likely than not that is a among the characteristics of a winner.

But I’m glad an ungentleman-like attitude is now a big no-no in a grandslam and so they penalize heavily those who grumble and whine. They should, as tennis is supposed to be a royal sport, a “sosi” entertainment for families of a king and queen, and, okay, a king’s concubine.

Of the four Grand Slam, I like to watch best is the Roland Garros or the French Open, which court thereof is made of clay. This is a bizarre surface since a lot of champions in the three other slams failed to conquer this in their big dismay.

The reason why I am in awe of Rafa when it comes to this surface since it’s clearly his forte. Judging from his 66-1 win-loss record as of today, you’d conclude in Roland Garros he’s born to play.

Look at the way he demolished again Novak Djokovic, also pretender to greatness, in the final match. Let me say, he did not just beat luckily the Serbian champ, he had him outwitted and outclassed.

Sometimes I ask the skies, the rainbow’s stripes and the star, why did tennis evade me like a plague throughout my existence so far? When at one time, so that my too much passion for it would be relieved, I nearly changed the meaning of RGF, my name’s acronym, into Roland Garros Facurib?

But there must be a reason, a very compelling reason, why I was not given the chance to play the sport much less in a clay court. Perhaps, that’s because I’ve yet to hurdle and conquer my life’s other surface like a version of tennis’ grasscourt and hardcourt.

Or maybe I’m in the middle of the Roland Garros-like game right now, unwittingly. Where the first order of battle is to succeed in conquering the first hard opponent, convincingly:

My own self. Made of clay. (Job 33:6; Isa. 64:8)