A Three-Year-Old Employee Not Making Minimum Wage

From the moment I could walk, I was “the project.” My dad had grown up in an athletic family, always tossing around any stray ball he could find or trying to catch a pick up game. He sharpened his skills, despite living in the concrete jungle of the Bronx, on stoops and intersections in the middle of traffic. In moving to Miami, he saw endless opportunities for year-round sports in a tropical haven with bountiful courts, fields, and, most importantly, players. When I was born, shock overcame him as he could not fathom relating to a girl in a world where a parent stereotypically presented a new daughter a doll instead of a football. But, as I quickly graduated from crawling to some mix of walking and stumbling, I showed unusual signs of athleticism that put me on my own path — one that I was unconscious of until many years later.

More specifically, I remember the moment when bouncing a ball became more than just a childish pursuit. I was in the Pinecrest Gym watching my dad run up and down the basketball court while I waited disciplined near the bleachers with a few of the other dads’ kids. I waddled up and down the perimeter trying to mimic his movements on the court. After the intense matchup of dry-heaving 40 something year olds, I was finally able to steal my dad’s attention and distract him from his frustration towards his team’s performance in his previous game. He gently handed the ball to his anxious three year old, who just wanted to imitate her dad, who at the time seemed so cool as he stood there triumphantly wringing out the sweat from his battered old college t-shirt. As soon as the ball left my sticky small palms, and I dribbled effortlessly down the court, I transformed before his eyes from a girl at her dad’s Sunday pickup game into a girl finding her ticket to college.

Between the ages of three and eight my dad searched for every ball, court, and field he could find in order to help me find my “passion,” although in reality it was much more than that. As I got older and bigger, negotiating my way through every type of sporting lesson my dad could enroll me in, the shots I hit and passes I kicked felt further and further beyond my control. After one too many thrown golf clubs, my “options” had been narrowed to soccer and tennis, two diametrically opposed sports. For starters, one was entirely individual, while the other was a codependent game that only functioned with a strong team community. In tennis, I was alone. You can look to your supporters on the sidelines and replay your coach’s advice, but there is no one on the court you can lean on to help you score that last point. But, I didn’t fully realize the loneliness of tennis until my path had been set in stone for years.

I was five when soccer was chosen for me. I played on the self-proclaimed “Pink Power Rangers” which was a YMCA team of rowdy pre-kindergarteners proudly sporting neon pink uniforms (as the name suggests). My usually present parents had left me alone on the field to go to a wedding on the other side of the country. But, with the attention span of a preschooler, I soon forgot my parents’ absence and was thrown into the game. Suddenly, the girls on my team were screeching my name as the ball slowly rolled to my cleat. This right touch was the start of my soccer “career.” Without knowing what I was doing, I dribbled past four defenders and knocked a shot into the left post of the miniature goal that at the time seemed caverness. The crowd roared and gave me a feeling I would want to hold onto forever. As the last whistle sounded, I had hammered 10 more goals past the “Yellow Lightning.” I knew I had done something unusual when my parents came home and showered me in boundless praise for my results, the spectacular nature of which had reached them in Colorado. The next eight years of soccer became more than a YMCA team with my florescent clad classmates, it became a process of getting results to move on to the next level.

At the same time my path was chosen for soccer, I was playing tennis once a week with my tireless father who tried to ring out any athletic spark he saw in me. I remember the first time, as a three year old, stepping foot on the local park’s hard courts which were just a walking distance from our house. I excitedly opened the gates to center court and took off with a Head racket choked in my right hand. The racket, salvaged for $1 from a church rummage sale, was as tall as my entire torso, making it hard to carry around. But I managed. Little did I know the sheer power a one dollar bill at a church pancake breakfast could have on my life. My dad stood on the same side of the net as I stood determinedly ready to defend my “side” of the half- court with whatever feed was tossed my way. After five slaps of solid forehand contact, my dad realized he had miscalculated my eye-hand coordination, and rectified his mistake by moving to the other side of the net. Little did he know that this would be one of thousands of tennis lessons that would eventually guarantee my college entrance, and that this would also mean that I would have to let go of the passion that made me happiest — soccer. Thus began my, or perhaps “our,” journey to college tennis.

When we moved to our new house which happened to be around the corner from a local tennis club, I began to take a once a week lesson with my first coach, Kerri. I played for fun, participating in the club tournaments and often beating the older neighborhood boys who taunted each other when they lost to me. My dad then began to enter me into local tournaments “just for fun.” I was nine years old when it hit me that tennis was something larger than just shanking a ball inside painted concrete. I found myself in the semifinals of the super series tournament that took place on the same professional courts as the Miami Open on Key Biscayne. My parents sat anxiously while I tried to transform into the professional players who had competed on these very stadiums just a few months before.

I was playing my longtime rival (who is training for the professional tour as I write this after spending a year at a well known service academy). She was the favorite as she was just a few slots ahead of me in the Florida state rankings. After two hours in the blistering heat exacerbated by record humidity, I had the upper-hand in the tiebreak up three points after splitting sets. Her father, a former player, kept giving his nine-year-old prodigy dirty looks and illegally coaching her behind the fence. Her body looked like it was slowly shutting down with every inch I made her work. At the water break, as I started to close out the match, the dad, with menacing tattoos engulfing his large frame, stomped over to my opponent’s side of the bench and handed her two tall cans. He shouted at her “finish one of these right now before you set foot on the court, and figure out how to focus.” His tone noticeably shocked my parents and we made uneasy eye contact while staring at a trembling little girl. Looking more closely my eyes bulged from my head as I saw she was chugging Redbull as the clock ticked down to signify the end of our allotted break. The energy drink helped to no avail as I quickly won the next few points to earn my slot in the finals.

After I stumbled off of the court clearly lacking electrolytes and badly sunburnt, my parents rushed me away into the AC of the clubhouse. I overheard their outrage at a father forcing his preteen daughter to chug bottles of a caffeine overloaded energy drink simply to get to the finals of a U10 tennis tournament. This moment proved to me this was no longer a hobby, it was becoming my career and I would need to make similar daunting sacrifices if I wanted to succeed in this game — ones that may be unhealthy and dangerous.

As I entered sixth grade, I was placed on the varsity high school team. Tennis became a part of my identity, as well as my parents’ identity, as they had spawned a successful tennis player. Whenever my relatives saw me they first asked about my progress in tennis and then about my academics. That part was flattering, but, in order to get to the collegiate level, I had to compete in tournament after tournament. I had to attend grueling practice in the sweltering Miami heat for hours on end until I could perfect a clean down the line backhand. I was forced to visualize and dream about the game. I had to eat certain foods according to my match times, or to avoid specific ones. My social life was a joke, as my friends slowly started to send me invitations to events knowing what my answer would be if it fell anytime between Thursday and Sunday. Sometimes at tournaments I would hope to lose, just so I could get out of the toxic atmosphere and be a kid for a second and maybe even catch the end of a birthday party.

I would cry before the tournament, during the tournament, and after the tournament. By the time I understood it was a college process, every single aspect of the sport disgusted me. Given that many foreign players would move to Florida to train at the tennis academies, I often encountered players who spoke no English. These players had everything to lose if they lost a match, as tennis was either going to be their ticket to a college scholarship or a way to earn a living as a pro player. Often, is was a family affair at the matches. As a result, if a player disagreed with one of my line calls, I would be absolutely berated by the other players’ parents in every language imaginable (mostly Russian) at least several times throughout a competition. I overheard a mother telling her child that I was extremely “fea” (the Spanish word for ugly) so if she lost to me it was ok because her looks would still prevail over my own. What killed me was the intense pressure I was under within the loneliest of all sports. There was nowhere to hide in tennis. I could not hide behind my friends and wait for them to score a goal or get scored on. All eyes were on me. So you can imagine when the college process was in full swing, it not only hurt my self-esteem and personal confidence, but helped to deeply impact my parents’ marriage and my relationships to my parents as they saw how the sport itself absolutely tore me down.

I hated the game, I hated the training, I hated the people, and I hated myself. I hated feeling alone in the world, and hated how my results determined if I was happy with myself that day. And, I hated how all the girls at the tournament hated you just as much as you hated them and would watch your match hoping you would lose so they could inch their way ahead in the rankings. Every time I lost, I would berate myself mentally and physically. I left a five star handprint on my thigh following one too many backhand misses out wide. Even though I competed at the highest of junior levels, I would constantly convince myself I would never achieve my goals with every point I lost. The sport owned my body, the college process owned my body, my coach owned my body, and my parents owned my body. The one person who was supposed to own her own body was so far removed from the process, she knew nothing else than to keep her head down and wait until the process came to a close. The sport even took over my mind.

Although I was unconscious of the fact that I did not own my body, I was conscious that I was simply unhappy. I was competing against homeschooled kids who trained every minute to reach the pro level (many of those competitors have now achieved this goal). This is what led me to setting the racket down my freshman year of high school. Quitting was one of the most liberating feelings of my entire life. I finally had control over my own body and what it would do. I had free time, I did not feel a pit in my stomach on the way to practice in the blistering sun after school or on the way to a match somewhere in Florida memorizing the strengths and weaknesses of my opponent in the car ride. I did not have to chug pickle juice to find some solution to my chronic debilitating cramping. I did not have to lace up the two ankle braces I proudly wore to show I was a longtime veteran of the sport. But, this did not last very long.

For the next year I tried to find my passion for a sport. I picked up soccer again and began training with my old travel team. But, this time I was not the leading scorer, I was not able to pass the girls as I had when I was younger. My position had been stolen and I reserved a seat on the bench, a foreign concept to me. The girls had gotten bigger, more talented, and faster. It was too late for me to get back to where I was if I wanted to succeed at the college level doing something I loved. I knew that, and my parents knew that. I even tried volleyball in the meantime since all of my school friends played together and I could finally be a part of their social circle. But, once again I was late to the game, and would not have enough time to reach the collegiate level. After intense discussions with my parents throughout that year where I owned myself, the topic of tennis returned time and time again. My grades suffered a little as my anxiety about my future continued. Competitive sports was always a part of my nature, and the idea of being without one that guaranteed me a college admission taunted me. By the end of my freshman year, it had been decided that I was returning to the court: this time being fully aware of the end goal and determined to work a nine-to-five job with no questions asked.

Because I was coming back to tennis after a long hiatus, I had to play catch up. There was a question of whether I would still be able to “make it.” After training with a prominent tennis Coach in Miami for a week, he convinced my parents and me to train with him full-time as he could promise me my D1 future I had always dreamed of. He told my parents that although he would have to alter almost every single one of my strokes, my ability to quickly adjust a movement would lead me to success. Despite my hatred of the brutal competition and all that came with it, this promise of a future so close to my grasp pushed me to commit to his academy. My dad handed me off to my new coach so I could be his next “project.” Coach called practice “work” and considered the entire college process on the court a “career.” Most of the girls training alongside me hated the game we were stuck in and treated it like a mundane job they could not escape. It got to a point where it was a common saying in my household that I would use tennis to get into college, and then quit after my first semester.

This job went on until it reached its peak during the summer before my senior year. I played showcase after showcase trying to flaunt my skills in front of every college coach I could manage. It was all a big game of which coach saw you make which shot during a given match. It was a show, and we were the puppets. My mom even ordered me all new outfits to play in, making me the entertainer and her the costume designer. She told me that “any edge we could manage, we would use,” and appearance was certainly one of them. The last and highest level tournament of the year in which the top players from all around the country tried to qualify for was the National Clay Court Championships U18 held in Memphis, Tennessee. The culmination of my career was to be determined here. And it was, but with no ease.

Unfortunately, there was a record breaking heatwave in Memphis that summer. I played my first match of the day and finished after two hours in 112 degree weather with ten coaches on my court making it hard for my parents to see the match. With five points to go, I felt my entire left side tense up causing me to collapse in intense agony. Like most other matches throughout the summer, the tension first rose up through my calves and I knew that if I did not get off the court soon, my entire body would ultimately give in to debilitating cramps. I finished the match (and fortunately won) and ran off the court pouring salt down my throat so I would be able to speak to coaches. But, as my discussions began the cramps progressed and took control. My parents politely excused me from my conversations and rushed me to the hotel to perform our weekly routine. My dad got the jugs of Pedialyte, my Mom helped me walk as I had lost control over my limbs, and Coach was whipping the car around with buckets of ice. We rushed to the hotel and I was thrown in an ice bath as energy drinks of every kind were passed my way. We had this down to a science at this point, everybody manning their station in order to get me ready for the next competitor so I could continue selling myself as a college product. But this time was different. My mom instantly broke down as she saw me trembling in the bathtub trying to regain feelings in my muscles. She expressed how sorry she felt for introducing me to the world of USTA and how she couldn’t believe that we were in this situation in the first place, or that it had even become the daily routine of our lives. But, we had no time for this. I had more matches to play and more strength to gain. The show was still on.

It was this moment when I truly realized what I was doing was neither a hobby or a game. You don’t go through the pain, the hatred, and the loneliness for something you’re supposed to love. It was a job that was thrown onto me that I did because I was good at it. It was as simple as that. I had been a three year old employee, with a low salary, who was trapped in a system of which I had no escape until my college admissions.

Although I was planning to quit in college, college tennis changed my outlook on the sport. I don’t feel alone, because I am not. I have eight girls cheering for me and supporting me from the sidelines. I play for no one but myself (and my team), now I am in better control of my own body. College tennis has shown me the pure love for the game, especially because there is no end goal in this four year process. I am playing because I want to play, no strings attached. On campus I have an identity and a family, and even though junior tennis was a nightmare, it has helped me to get to where I am today and for that I am grateful.