Today I decided I was going to play a game of racquetball.  It’s been reasonably nice out and that put me in the mood to get active.  I’ve never played racquetball before, but I knew it was going to be intense. A little over a year ago I would never had thought about playing racquetball – but that was over 300 pounds ago.  I like to say i’ve lost over two Justin Biebers, it just sounds more impressive.

So I wake up early with my buddy and head to a local YMCA to meet my buddy, take a tour of the building, and hear to the courts.  He explains to me how to play – seemed simple enough, so we geared up.  We started off slow and leisurely hitting the ball around untul deciding it was time to get serious.

Did I mention i’d never played racquetball before?  Even having lost 300 pounds i’m a long way from my goal and am not, in any way, in good shape. The ball bounces off the wall and comes straight at my incredibly fast.  Swing and a miss as the balls flies past me.  I didn’t realize how fast the ball was going to go!

First lessons learned: Be Prepared and Try harder next time.

He servers again and I track the ball with a new determination in my mind.  The ball is high and I think about jumping for it – but decide it’s a bad idea so I let it bounce behind me and I take off running at the back wall.  It bounces off the back wall where I connect my racquet with the ball sending it flying off the back wall towards my opponent. It was epic and masterfully played (I think!) but I forgot one small thing.

Lesson three:  When you focus you can excel, even as a beginner.

What did I forget again? Oh, that’s right. Stopping. I ran into the back wall right after making the play slamming my forehead and knee into the back wall.  I screamed an expletive, dropped the f-bomb, and fell flat on my back. Ouch.

Lesson four: Don’t forget to stay aware of surroundings when focused on the task at hand.

Lesson five: Don’t run into walls.

Apparently the fall and f-bomb were loud enough to cause a nursing student and YMCA lifeguard nearby to run in to check out what had happened.  I was mostly fine – some small cuts across my nose, bruise on my forehead and knee, stiff back, and bruised ego.

I’m not quite ready to try my hand at racquetball again tomorrow,  but soon.