I Can Be Your Hero

So, over the past couple of months I've began to play racquetball pretty regularly with a couple of other guys on Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings at 5 am. I'm at least moderately athletic, and after a couple of weeks I was able to get close to their level where I was at least competitive. Over the last month or two, I've noticed that I am almost on equal playing level with them (which to me just means that I win games pretty much as often as they do). It's a lot of fun, and a great workout, as I always come out drenched in sweat after about 75 minutes of playing in the morning. My wife can describe it as me looking like I just climbed out of the river, while the other two guys don't even look like they've broken a sweat. Endearing, I know...

Well, even though I feel like I'm improving, I still do stupid stuff and make erroneous plays basically every time we play. If nothing else, I'm good for a dose of comic relief. You see, I basically have to levels of athletic play in me. 1) The level that I play at for competitive sports, such as football, basketball, baseball and track that I competed in during high school. Competition was important then, and I tried to have fun. 2) The level that I now find myself playing basically all things at. I play for fun, for the workout, and to generally improve at whatever I'm doing. Similar to the weekly Thursday night sand volleyball games that I participated in during high school with my friends. We were out there for bragging rights and the glory of the moment, not to try to when games on a school team.

Anyway, back to the humorous events during racquetball. I've recently been successful at running into the wall while not looking at it, hitting myself in the face with the ball (thank God for goggles), hitting myself in the mouth with the ball (swollen lip from that), tripped over the lines on the floor (yeah, read it again - you'll know what I mean), and lastly the moment I've dubbed as the "Slow-Motion, I Can Be Your Hero, Baby" instance.

The ball was bouncing high, over my head, and I was backpedalling to get into position, and at just the right time, I leapt as high as I could and took a mighty swing at the ball... and whiffed. Completely, 100%, I might as well have been trying to fan Cleopatra whiff. I have no idea how far off I was from making contact, but after it happened, I could only imagine what it must have looked like - and in my head it was in slow-motion, and Enrique Iglesias was belting out his oh-so-over-played ballad. But hey, no matter how sad that was, wouldn't you be intimidated by the guy below? :)