By Constanza Baeza Valdenegro

I got a wild card, a special invitation to a tennis event, which will be held in my country. I don’t think they are particularly happy with me being among the players. Last time I was at the federation’s building the president got angry after I told him he does nothing to improve national tennis. I must admit I wasn’t very nice when I said those things and I really thought I’d have to find another federation to represent. I sent him an e-mail with my most sincere apologies (I swear they were sincere) and he accepted them. So, I’ve been invited to this tournament after more than one year of injuries and depressing thoughts. I suppose that my coach has something to do with the invitation. I imagine him using his best linguistic resources to melt the supervisors’ hearts with the story of my sad days without tennis. 

I’ve always loved the incongruence between the word wild and tennis life. Wildness is not allowed in our sport. Every time I get some breeze of craziness, my old coach, that stubborn and moody guy who knows me since I was seven, brings me down to Earth with the strength of a strict father. To be ‘wild’ in tennis is something you must avoid. Everything in tennis obeys a rigorous schedule. From an early age I learned to say no to things that people of my age could enjoy without feeling guilty. My sybarite impulses were tamed by rigid diets, and pizzas, chocolate and unhealthy things were not often in front of my eyes, although I must admit that when I started winning small tournaments, I used to buy lots of chocolate boxes that I would need in case of a sad defeat. Once I got drunk after a very tough loss, and my coach punished me with even tougher training seasons. It’s the only time I’ve ever been drunk. 

So I got this wild card for a small tournament after a long time of recovery. I’m thirty-one, so every time I get injured, I feel huge anxiety, thinking that it could be the end of my not very successful career. This one was tough and scary: a knee injury. I thought I wouldn’t be on a court ever again. Sleepless nights, anguish, thoughts about retiring were the usual ingredients of my recovery. When I started practicing and noticed that I still needed some time, I preferred to go slowly, but my anxiety was still there. 

It has been crazy. This is the longest period I’ve ever spent at home since I started playing tennis. Fourteen months. How can I make up my mind about this new reality? Even speaking my first language had brought some alienation. I used to go around the world, speaking English, and now I feel strange with my own language. My body feared its new freedom. I could stay in bed until 11 a.m., but I never felt relaxed. My body and my mind knew their past life. 

I’ve cried in front of a few people: my coach, my parents, my partner. I’ve never cried in front of my daughter, with the typical and very selfish reason that we parents need to avoid tears so that we can show our strength to our kids. It doesn’t work. She can feel my pain. She is very sensitive to adult sadness and never get fooled by my smile.

Sometimes I get that anxiety of wanting to be on the court again, but then I look at my daughter and feel guilty. These hours of intense sadness and nostalgia for courts should be joyful. When she was born, I spent only two weeks with her. Then, brokenhearted, I had to fly away, leaving this baby with her perplexed mother. What kind of father am I? She was just two weeks old, and I was already leaving her! I was so disappointed with my ambitious horizons. Now she enjoys my presence, unaware that I shouldn’t be home. Finally, to be with her is more important than my entire career. 

I’ll be playing on Tuesday. It has been a long time, and I feel like a junior player, with the same nervousness. I’ll try to do my best as always. That day I will be the boy who played his first event, more than twenty years ago. And just like the boy I used to be, I love what I do.  

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Constanza Baeza Valdenegro was born in 1985. She lives in the Chilean countryside. She likes languages, tennis, stationery, pastel colors and knowledge.