EVERY VICTORY IS A DEFEAT

Remember the poem by Shelley: My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings  Look on my works, Ye Mighty and despair.....


When you get to the top of the mountain....look for another mountain.

Climbing is life. The trophies mean nothing but the climb. Your joy is in direct proportion to the effort put in, and you and you alone can ever know how hard the struggle was.

Someone said that all politics end in defeat. As does life. Victories are just moments, and like Shelley's statue in the desert, they will soon be covered by the dust of the ages. The only thing that will live on is the memory, and memory is love. Nothing else.

Remember that, and have it etched in your mind as this was carved in stone in the Alhambra.

E. V. D.

Every Victory is a Defeat.

EVERY VICTORY IS A DEFEAT

Alhambra Granada

Mar 2013

OZYMANDIAS

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: `Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear --
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.' 

Percy Bysshe Shelley

WHEN YOU MEET ONE OF YOUR HEROES

My friend Andrea invited me to Wimbledon, but with a special twist. We would have a chance to hit with Stan Smith, who was in the final against John Newcombe when I was in England in 1971 playing tennis tournaments (he lost that year, but won the next against Nastase and was number 1 in the world) and who was always my favourite player. Why? Because he was calm, because he was classy, because he was a gentleman.

He also featured in one of my less proud moments. When I went to see him in Charlotte NC (I can't remember if it was the Davis Cup, which I did go to, but I think not....it may have been just a regular tournament). In any case, he was being interviewed after a match walking back to the locker room. In those days there was no security, and players were....accessible...and nice (with the exception of Cliff Ritchey, who was a sourpuss).

Anyway, I was walking next to Stan, and noticed that his wristband was hanging out of his pocket. Being what my doubles partner and best mate Randy said I was, a twirpster, I made a move to filch it. Faster than you can say fast, Stan's right hand shot out and grabbed my wrist. He looked at me and said (rather forcefully): Do you want it? Uh......Yes, I said embarrassed. Then ask for it....nicely.


Lesson learned.

So, as far as Stan Smith was concerned, I had prior.

What happens when you meet a legend?

Well, if you are like me, your brain scrambles. I arrived early, went to the court, and began knocking up with a nice Serbian girl (who had trained at Nick Bolletieri's). I felt relaxed, loose. Then Stan arrived, dressed in his Davis Cup captain's tracksuit, and thwang.....I tightened up like a guitar string.

We had a clinic, and he gave many good pointers, both in general (stretch, keep your head still and pivot around it, worry only about the point of contact...always out in front) and specifically to me (hold the ball for the service toss in only two fingers, the middle and the ring finger, make your backhand follow through long (I tend to come across it). Then he said we would break into groups and play a round robin against him and his fellow pro and partner Gary and another top teaching pro (Bob?), rotating after every four games. Then there was a prize for the winner.

I started off with Andrea against Stan and a competent player.

And lost 0-4.

I was still tight, completely disregarding what Stan had just finished telling me. This is what happens when you get on a tennis court with someone who used to be no.1 in the world.

So no chance at winning, I thought to myself. Forget it. Just give it a go. Eye on the ball. Head still.  Just smack it.

Our lives are filled with countless moments, the vast majority of which pass into oblivion unnoticed, unremembered. Even those which are important are important only to us, and for different reasons.

I remember two from the rest of that morning. One is hitting a topspin backhand to break Stan as he came to the net (by the way, he was serving a 1/2 speed, it should be added). The second is being down 0-40, having Stan say: I'll give you $100 bucks if you can ace me, and coming back to tie the match, and then winning the last one playing with Stan for two games and with Bob? for the last two. I didn't ace him, but I did ace Andrea.

Then there was the prize ceremony, and I said to Stan's assistant Stuart: Hold on, let me get my camera so I can take a picture of the winner, and having him say: Well, you'd be taking a picture of yourself.

What?

So there you have it.

I told Stan and the assembled folk the pickpocket confession, and while I stood there, Stan wrote on the prize, a racquet, and showed me what he had written on the cover:

TO ERIC, GREAT PLAYING FOR A PICKPOCKET.  STAN SMITH

Franz Kafka once said that life is a series of small scale victories and large scale defeats.

In the great scheme of things, this was a small scale victory, by anyone's measurement.  Except for me.

Life is a great inexplicable circle, and sometimes, just sometimes if you are very lucky, you get to meet one of your heroes.

DON'T DOUBT. DO.

4AM.


Never a good time, but the best time for doubt. In the middle of the night, the barely active mind can sift through the unconscious and dredge up a thousand excuses for failure, details that might go wrong, regrets for things done or left undone,  worries about the future or dreams that may never happen.


It is a time to glance over at the clock, and groan. There is almost nothing good about 4AM.


Except.


Sometimes in the midst of the miasma of self examination, an insight can be had.


Sometimes a pattern can be discerned through the fog of semi-consciousness. Sometimes a eureka moment can pierce through the gloom, a pinpoint of light from off in the distance.


Of course. It is so simple. So obvious. The word doubt itself.


It is an anagram. 


Rearrange the letters.


DO BUT.


Doubt is doing, but doing at half speed. Not being fully engaged.  Looking while leaping. Being a spectator in your own scene. Letting fear rule. Stopping nature but added a comma where there should be a full stop. Second guessing. Thinking about the past instead of the present. Doubt, is doing, but with an unnecessary addendum. 


Doubt is doomed to failure. 
 
Want to know what a champion thinks of doubt? Martina Navratilova, when asked what made a champion, said total commitment. Prompted to clarify, she said, it's like with ham and eggs. The chicken is involved, but the pig is committed. Undoubtedly. Totally. Unequivocally. No but.


That is why Nike uses as its slogan Just do it. Do without asking why. Get to the point where you trust yourself totally, where your mind, heart, body and soul meld into one, where you strip off the But from Do, leaving the essence of your being.


Forget the voice inside your head at 4AM, and get some rest for a new day.


Don't doubt. Do.