Dear Wonderful Fans,
With the conclusion of a really great weekend, we are off to National Team Indoors in just over a week! This is an awesome opportunity for us to play some of the best teams in the nation. Jamie presented us with our famous tennis center quote on Friday: “ We set standards that make others wish they played for Duke.” After the playing this weekend and the overall energy, we are definitely ready to live up to the challenge of setting a higher standard for ourselves and for the other teams out there.
In this blog I’d like to introduce you all to the three honorary members of our team, our three lucky charms— Albert, the tennis fairy, Dobby the gnome and Bumper the Leprechaun. This may seem a little strange to some of you (DWT is sane, don’t worry) but I think that these three little characters have earned their way into our team and have become an integral part of the locker room.
Here’s a little background: Dobby, personally named by our Harry Potter wiz- Hanna- lives in his own little garden house on our windowsill. His dear friend, Albert, who has a Santa Claus-ish beard, BRAIDED EYEBROWS and who is dressed in a very abstract glittery outfit, has his very own tennis racket and resides next to Dobby. Oh, and Albert originated in one of Trice’s Christmas gifts last year. Big Ray’s little, green leprechaun, Bumper, is cased in one of the smallest containers I’ve ever seen. Despite us begging her to release him, Rachel refuses because apparently he’s guarding a gold coin (I don’t know any Irish folklore but apparently a leprechaun cannot stop guarding this coin to bring luck.). Anyways, Bumper lives on the same windowsill in our locker room and accompanies Big Ray in her matches each week.
Why are these abstract charms so important? Well, they’re our lucky charms of course but more importantly, they have become a kind of pre-match locker room attraction and ritual for us— they make us laugh!
There is no denying that everyone gets a little nervous before matches. This is good. A little nerves, when managed correctly, makes one more ready to play and more energetic on the court. But it is when nerves get the better of us that we stop seeing the fun in playing and we become too serious. I know that each girl will tell you that they play best when they’re having fun out there. While they’re having fun, they transfer the positive energy to the rest of the team and before long, we’re all having fun, we’re positive and more often than not, we’re winning. I think that the rest of the team will agree with me when I say that there’s no better way to have fun than to laugh… and that’s precisely what our lucky charms represent in our locker room.
Whether it is a funny story, a joke, or just us being silly, every girl on this team knows how to laugh at themselves and with others. We try and bring a light atmosphere to every practice, match and event so that we aren’t only getting the job done, but we’re having fun doing it. Beyond teammates, DWT is a wonderful friendship circle and we’re proud of it! And thanks, to our three little lucky charms, we have daily reminders of the importance of having fun together.
Next weekend, we play Northwestern at noon on Saturday (4th Feb.). We hope that you can all come out and support us because we always value you all cheering us on.
GO DUKE!
Yours in Tennis,
Monica Gorny and the rest of DWT.
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