I am suddenly and unexpectedly spending a lot of time in the house of the Umpire Who Gave Birth to me. She took a tumble shortly before Thanksgiving and has been in the hospital until yesterday. There is a whole lot more to the story. The trivial side effect of that development relevant to this blog is that I am finding all sorts of tennis artifacts in her house. In fact, I am probably going to be writing a lot in the future about some of these found objects.
I have been on an archeological dig in the sauna, a feature of this house that deserves its own commentary. When the realtor showed my parents this property, the sauna was unveiled with a “close the deal” flourish. What the Umpire Who Gave Birth to me heard was “Giant Cedar Closet.” In fact, that is the only purpose it has ever served. I think it would be nice to have a sauna… but then where would she store all the Christmas decorations?
There was a tennis racquet in the sauna, which was an unexpected surprise. The Umpire who gave Birth to me hasn’t played tennis in many years. Additionally, all the racquets in her house were gathered up and donated to a tennis development program sponsored by the Wichita Falls Tennis Association many years ago. This particular racquet survived the purge by hiding between the heating element in the sauna and one of the walls.
The racquet was completely unrecognizable to me other than one feature. Taped inside the throat of a racquet was a message in all caps. “NOTHING IS AS IMPORTANT AS IT SEEMS!” In “But Seriously, the Racquet,” which was the very first official post on this site, I wrote about how I used to tape messages to the racquet of the (former) Umpire I Gave Birth To.
My brother quickly identified the racquet as one that he used briefly while playing in college. The first university he played for had signed a contract with an “up and coming racquet manufacturer” to use their equipment. He characterized the frame as “total crap.” The 30+ intervening years wedged in the sauna was probably only partially responsible for the decrepit condition.
While this is clearly my brother’s racquet and his handwriting, he did not recall inscribing that particular message. I feel like it is a message from above relevant to our current situation. Over the past few days, I have used this phrase as a mantra when dealing with the medical situation of the Umpire Who Gave Birth to Me. It has a calming effect.
Nothing is as important as it seems.
