tennis, anyone?

So... signing Charlie up for a 3-year-old soccer team was ridiculous, but private tennis lessons seem reasonable? -Lesley

(Guest writer Chris Hedrick)

It’s time…

It’s time to embark on the adventure of tennis with my oldest son Charlie. The free ride is over. He’s loafed around snuggling with his mommy for too long. He’s played with enough cars and mastered enough puzzles. His baby time is up and it’s time to be a man. The morning we started playing tennis I drew a little tiny hair on his chest using a marker. This was a symbol to him, myself and God that it is time to leave childish things behind and start playing the die hard sport of tennis (soon he will be dating and I’m teaching him how to drive a stick shift). Charlie is a little athlete; he is light on his feet and has great hand-eye coordination. (My second son Ethan is a different kind of athlete…he will be America's next hope in the sport of sumo). Charlie is 3 1/2 and I was excited to teach him one of my favorite games with hopes of one day living vicariously though him. My plan is to lure Charlie in by making the game fun. Only later (and by that I mean in 2 years) we will turn up the heat on his practices by running side aching suicides and launching 80 mile an hour serves at him. Then if all goes to plan, we will pull him out of school and start his real training, treating tennis as a job as I search for a sponsor. One day I hope to make enough money to build a house that will provide ample room to build a tennis court (this will be Charlie’s new home complete with a water bed and John McEnroe bedding).

For now we are making the game fun. I focus on the basic basics with my future champion. First we stretch; this is mainly for me as I am now old and require a mild warm up. During our stretching, we talk about the pressing matters in his life, I ask him if he’s gone poo poo today, we talking about his mommy, and he shows me the bruises from where Ethan hit him.

Then we play two basic games to start our practice. Both of these games are intended to get my boy comfortable with his racquet. We concentrate on hitting the ball in the middle of the strings. We keep a count of how many times we can hit it back and forth between us. Even though he will soon leave school for his chosen career path, it is important that he is able to count all the money he will bring in (to the family). It’s also important for Charlie to learn how the ball bounces and to move his feet to get to the ball.

The next thing we do is work on his forehand. This is the only shot he knows and he is developing nicely. I have broken the stroke down into bite size pieces for a preschooler to understand. With his body already turned sideways (later he will learn to turn himself as a part of a full swing) he starts his swing from low to high. We talk about his follow through and I’ve showed him that as a part of his follow though he must send his bicep toward his chin (this is an easy way of illustrating the follow thru for a tater tot like Charlie).

Charlie’s favorite part of our tennis is using the ball machine to pick up the balls. Out of laziness I allow him to. I like to picture each ball lying on the ground as a potential hundred dollar bill. I let my mind drift to future days, Charlie holding the Wimbledon trophy over his head as he thanks God and his Da Da for all the hard work I put in over the years. I hold my hand up to the crowd and humbly accept his kind words. His mom is looking on with tears in her eyes wearing a fur coat that Charlie bought her. Ethan is with us that day and he’s sitting in two seats and wearing a sumo diaper built for a giant. These are days to be fond of, this is our future.

At the end of each practice, once the balls have been collected and we are on our way out, we have our traditional final high five. We grab our racquets and I talk to him about the house I want him to build me one day, he laughs and I assure him that I am dead serious.

Cheers to the future.