Mad Tennis Skillz

On Saturday afternoon, I went over to hang out with my son, Tanner, who lives with his mom. The only real "parental duty" I had on my agenda was to gently nudge him into trying a bit harder in his job-hunting activities. About three weeks ago, we spent an intensive day on preparing him to blanket the world with résumés and connect himself to every important contact via networking...but the results have been, uh, disappointing.

Beyond that duty, though, my purpose was to just hang out with him and enjoy his company. Slacker though he may be when it comes to gainful employment, I always get a kick out of the kid. He's fun.

When I got there, he was playing the piano, doing an extended jazz improv that contained recognizable components of many different songs, but didn't really stick with any of them. I enjoyed it so much that I just sat and listened for probably about 15 or 20 minutes before I finally asked him what he wanted to do. Wanna see "Iron Man"? Wanna get something to eat? No? Well, then grab your racket, and let's head for the tennis courts.

When Tanner was much younger, I allowed him to score points, but never believed in the idea that you should let your kid win. Oh yeah, I absolutely believe in the idea of helping your child build self-esteem and confidence, but didn't think it made any sense to do that by giving them a false sense of how the world works. That's also why I hate the idea of not keeping score in youth soccer games, and other such ridiculous attitudes. In the real world, being the fastest or scoring the most points means that you win -- and the person who wins gets the rewards. That's just the way it is.

Unfortunately for my kid, that meant that when he and I would engage in some sort of competition, he'd come home in second place. Still, he seemed to enjoy himself, and would come return for more, so I saw no problem with it.

(Hmm. I suddenly wonder if this "not letting him win" thing is why he no longer seems enthusiastic about hanging out with his old man. There are even times when he is sullen, argumentative, and acts like he thinks he's smarter than I am. -- Oh wait...that's the definition of being a teenager, isn't it? Plus, he actually is smarter than I am. Not wiser, mind you -- he's got a lot of life to life yet before he will really have an adult perspective on things -- but he is a pretty sharp kid.)

Anyway, this particular sword had a double edge that I didn't think about until a few months ago, when he actually beat me in a tennis match. Because it has always been clear that I would not "let" him win, it suddenly occured to me that he would know that, on that particular day at least, he was a better tennis player than I was. And once the kid knew that, how could I ever again exert any parental authority over him?

Fortunately, he was gracious in his victory. He didn't even do an "in your face" dance or moonwalk or anything. He merely made a few Ali-esque comments about being "too fast" and a few SnoopDog-esque comments about having too many "skillz", and let it rest. I think he suspected that I had just had a bad day, and our next match may not go his way.

But it did. And so did the next one. In fact, his third consecutive victory was the most impressive of all -- he came back from being down 4-0 and won going away. And that time, he celebrated by jumping over the net...which would've been more impressive if his pants hadn't fallen down on impact. (Did I mention that he's a teenager? It probably says something positive about his tennis ability that he was able to win while wearing fashionably low-riding cargo pants...but whatever boost he gets from that was diminished by seeing them fall down to reveal SpongeBob underwear. Someday I'll tell you about our "how are cool-looking pants that fall down any different than your generation's Beatle haircuts?" discussions, but not today.)

Anyway, back to Saturday's game: It was a massacre. We both played well, hitting kill shots, avoiding unforced errors, and covering the court like a blanket. But while we reached deuce in several of the games, I came out on top in all but one of our games. I would've vaulted the net at the end, to give him a bit of his own medicine, but with a vertical leap that tops out at about 2.5 inches, I thought it best not to try. I'd lose any psychological impact if I fell on my face during my victory celebration.

But it was a victory! My parental authority is back! As James Brown would say (if he wasn't dead), "I feel good!"

I can't wait until the next game.

Have a great day!

PS. Yeah, yeah -- I know that beating my kid in tennis has nothing whatsoever to do with parental authority. Please don't call Social Services on me. Trust me, I know that once a kid reaches his teens, the only way to keep his respect is to act honorably, listen to what he has to say, and treat him as an independent and fully functional human being. (Well, that, and remind him that you still control his bank account and food supply. Bwahhh haaa haa ha!)