Not What We Planned

Yesterday started right on plan. We woke up early, gathered our bags, and checked out of the hotel in time to eat a good breakfast at our favorite spot, the OK Cafe. From there we were right on time to get to the club to watch some of the singles finals before Phil played his doubles final.

Right on plan.

Singles matches played, and around noonish Phil got a good warm up in and started preparing his mind and body for his scheduled 1:30 match.

Right on plan.

Around 1:15 as singles matches were finishing and courts were opening for the doubles finals to go on. Phil happened to notice that one of his opponents, who was also in the finals of another age group, was on the court playing that final. What?? They had just started, which meant Phil's match with this player wouldn't start for at least another hour to hour and a half.

Not what we planned.

When I booked our return flights home, I figured that an 8:00 pm departure would be plenty late for us to make, if he had a final to play on Sunday.
And it would have if things had gone to plan.

The final we were waiting on to finish went three sets....of course! So Phil's match didn't go on until almost 4:00. I didn't want Phil to worry, while he was playing, about hurrying to get to the airport, turn in our car, check in, and get to our gate. If you've been to Atlanta lately, you know what the traffic can bring. So while they were warming up I rescheduled us on the 10:00 flight.

Not what we planned.

Phil and Tom started strong and won the first set in a tiebreaker (7-4). They held and broke to go up 2-0 in the second set. Things were looking good! Then slowly but surely you can feel the momentum changing. Their opponents started making less errors, and seemed to be sharper than they were the first set. Phil served and returned well. It was all the shots in between that fell short.
After splitting sets, they lost the third set 6-1. Ouch.

Not what we planned.

A very disappointed Phil showered at the club, then we left to grab a quick bite before heading to the airport. Had I not changed our flight we would have never made our original flight. We landed home around midnight and by the time we got our bags, took the shuttle to get our car and made it home it was well after 1:00 am, then close to 2 before we went to bed.

Not what we planned.

Fortunately we have the most awesome help at Tarpon Cove in Dave Estep. We were able to sleep in this morning and not worry about getting to work at any special time. We did go in mid morning for a short time, to find that things have quieted considerably with the season ending. Nice!

The good news is I was able to watch all of Phil's matches without any problems. I was nervous at times, but for the most part I kept my emotions in check. Having my friend Bari there with me as a distraction was a big help!

Now it's time for both Phil and I to work on our games and get ourselves in playing shape. More importantly it's time for us to enjoy the summer.

Just like we planned!



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