There are a number of women at the MGC that I like and admire, Janice Benton, comes to mind immediately. Rita Berkowitz, who I don't really know, but I spent a New Year's Eve with her and I was fascinated by the Turban she wears. I'd like to get to know her better, but that seems unlikely. Karen, a friend we had in common, has moved to Savannah, where we'll be visiting shortly.
If I think about women who have been kind to me? That would include Sue Lotz, Ellen Smith, Mary Jane O'Hare, Sigi Lindo, Karen Lindholm, Linda Sterling, M.T. O'Neill, Alex Mulderry, Gail Baird, Betsy Berra, Jane Berra, Penny Boorman, Terri Breen, Connie Duhamel, there are others, whose names I've forgotten.
My second year playing paddle tennis, I got talked into being Captain of the lowly E Team by the Pro who has since left. It was hardly a team. There never were enough players. A real challenge. However, by making what seemed like hundreds of phone calls, I amassed enough players who knew what they were doing to win our series that year, or whatever it was called and we moved up to another series. Something, I'm told, that hadn't happened in a number of years. Looking back, I now understand why. Moving up, of course, being what a lot of people there were very interested in doing, Paddle wise and Socially, but it seemed to me there was a bit of team spirit missing.
So many women wanted to win. They were very competitive, but they didn't want to subjugate their ego to do so. It made it difficult. Not much team spirit. I remember one women whose only concern was to continue playing a lead position, whether she had the ability to play a lead position or not. The Pros really had their hands full. Their job depended on the Members liking them, but the Members also wanted to be on a winning team. They, the members, didn't want to be repositioned, they wanted to continue playing in whatever spot they had become accustomed to playing in .They wanted to win, but they might not really be an asset to a particular team, yet they wanted to win. That presented a dilemma for the Pros.
The Pros didn't have the wherewithall to simply have try outs. Establish a ladder. Let women compete for the best spots. The better player, plays the better spot. Oh, that was too simple and too scary for all those women who were entrenched in "their spots."
The A team had to have decent players and the A team players had been on the A team for a long time. When a new member came along who could have and should have been playing on the A team, the Pros had a problem. They couldn't upset the status quo. Someone had to break a leg or go out injured before the new person could get put into the game.
The B, C, D and E teams were much more of a mess because those players didn't compete against other A teams, but B, C, D, and E teams from other clubs in other series and some other designation I can't remember now. It took a computer, I'm sure to figure out the Paddle Tennis Season of games between all the competing clubs in all the different series, divisions, levels of teams, etc. If the B team had played against the A team they would have lost every game. Some of the women on the A teams won State and National Championships and they made it look so easy.
The teams and the players on the B, C, D, and E teams had varying levels of playing ability and they all wanted to be, of course the #1 player on the nearest to the A team they could be. There were a lot of good players who were not pushy, who didn't get to play up to their abilities. And there were a lot of soso players who, because of seniority or pull or a loud voice got to play above their abilities. Sometimes it was subtle, sometimes not so subtle.
So moving up from the E team to the D, to the C, to the B was like moving up in Society, but the small, cloistered Society of the MGC. I wonder if the new pros, there have been two sets since I played, ever established a Ladder, a roster where the best players are on the A team, due to their ability and the B players play not as well as the A team, and C team, etc. I'll have to ask the new Pro. Nice guy. They are all nice guys. They have to be nice to the Members. Who knows what they say when the Members aren't around.
Actually, hanging out with the Pros the day before the matches as Captain of the E Team, after practice, trying to figure out who to put in what slot, I got to hear a little of what the Pros did say about some of the Members. Pretty funny!
Perhaps what makes me remember the "Ladies" of the MGC and not think of them, overall, fondly, is, the women who weren't nice to me were so mean and horrible and hateful to me they made a much bigger impression than the women who were "nice" to me.
I can say that of all the women at the MGC I have been invited to only one woman's house. Karen. She is the wife of the former Mayor of Montclair who Skip worked with during his 25 year stint as Chairman of the Planning Board. All before my time. For some reason she took a liking to me and I to her, even though we can NEVER talk about politics. She gets too upset if I say something negative about a Republican or something positive about a Democrat, kinda thing.
Well, I/we did get invited to an elaborate cocktail party at a huge house on Upper Mountain Ave, when I first arrived in Montclair and first started playing/learning to play Paddle Tennis. Everyone in Tuxedos before the annual Anniversary Ball, sort of thing. We went, saw a couple of women I knew who were also learning to play Paddle, but I was never invited back. Nor did I invite any of the "Ladies" except one, Karen and her husband, to our place. Karen was amused. We like to laugh together.
I could tell right away that our two bedroom apartment on the second floor in the Central Business District, where we can walk to everything including the YMCA, the Movies, Library and now even a Starbucks, without a dining room, might not be on the party circuit that these women frequented.
I'll always remember a certain woman, who will remain nameless, unless you ask me off-line, who often played #1 on the E Team. She had been an Investment Banker and her husband had retired at age 40 with approximately 40 million dollars, (that was the rumour) I happened to be having dinner with Skip at the MGC the night they threw a huge party to celebrate his "retirement." They were in a private room off the dining room, but making, I thought, quite a lot of noise, so we asked what was going on and someone told us.
It was my practice to call each woman the night before the weekly match and tell them what position they were playing, make sure they knew what Club we were playing against, etc. I had trouble reaching this woman, had left messages at her home, on her cell, etc. As I was walking my dog, old Shebarita, outside our apartment, She, the nameless woman, drove up in her powder blue Mercedes SUV. She looked us over, Sheba Deba and me and burst out laughing. I guess it was just too much for her to see where we lived or how I was dressed or the fact that Sheba was a "mixed Breed" not pure bred, or whateveritwas, she simply laughed right AT me, took in the information I gave her and drove off at speed.
Now you might think I'm reading something into her behavior or I'm mistaken and she wasn't really laughing AT me. But this is the woman that I played against in practice. She would simply hit the ball straight at me as hard as she could whenever she got the chance. "That's O.K. Angel," I would say, "It's good practice for me to fend off, be ready, alert. Keep 'em coming" The Pro looked at me when I said it, smiled and we went back to practicing.
She is also the woman I played with on the MGC tennis team, can't remember what team that was. It wasn't the A or B team, I'm sure of that. Anyhow I was playing with a woman whose name escapes me. We had nearly won our match at the Far Hills or Short Hills or Some, very pretty, but forgetable Club. One of the women we were playing against had lost one of her Diamond ear rings just before the match, or misplaced one, and she was distracted, so we almost won our match, but didn't. We didn't care. We had fun. However as we walked off the court in our white, white tennis clothes, over the grass, on a lovely, sunny, Spring day, we were met by, Nameless. "Did you Win?" she asked. She turned her back on us and walked away when we told her no.
Or the day Sheba had a stroke a short time before I was due at practice. I took her to the Vet, got some advice and some medicine. Got Sheba settled at home and raced to Paddle Practice. As I walked on to the court I said to, "Nameless" and another woman who never spoke directly to me, "I'm sorry I'm late. My dog had a stroke." The two women, one of whom had dogs of her own that she brought to the Club with her and left in her car during practice, looked at me, said nothing, and we preceded to practice for the match the next day. Do these women have ice in their veins?
Something about that encounter made me realize that these were not your average friendly, "nice" people. These were women who were looking out for Number One and if you didn't have something they wanted or something they could take from you they were not interested in you, your dog, or much of anything, as long as the E team won.
When we did win our series one of the women bought a card, most team members signed it. I have it someplace. They gave me a gift certificate to Barnes and Noble, if I remember correctly. I took the gift certificate and bought myself a copy of Sibley's book about birds. When the Tennis Team or the Paddle Tennis Team I used to play on plays their matches on Wednesdays, in the Spring I'm leading a Warbler Walk up at Garret for the Montclair Bird Club, in the Fall and Winter I'm not even thinking about the Ladies Paddle Team.
There were a number of women who returned by phone calls, women I'd never met, who graciously filled in on the E team and were fun to play with. There were a number of women or a couple who became my "best friend" on the Paddle team, who wanted to play and play in the spots they were used to playing in, etc. I got phone calls night after night at home. I heard the MGC gossip, what I could follow of it. I knew only a couple of people socially and couldn't follow who was related to who, who was getting married, divorced, cheating on their spouses. I needed a play card, as "they" say, and I didn't have one, to know the players. A card with a little bio attached. All the gossip detracted from the Paddle team, I thought. It was good that I didn't know who was friendly with whom. I just concentrated on who could play Paddle and who couldn't and with the help of the two Pros we decided each week who was going to play where on the team.
So, those few women were very friendly to me while I was Captain. I don't think I have heard from them since and that was nearly ten years ago. I can't say that I have ever had much social contact with any of the women at the MGC, other than Karen and Penny, wives of Skip's friends, but it could be, as my mother always used to say, "For the Best, Dear."
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