It’s not a big deal if a banker hates his job. Or if a doctor complains about working long hours. We accept this dissatisfaction, perhaps because it’s so commonplace.
But it’s different when a celebrity says it. You don’t expect Spielberg to say he hates making movies, or J.K. Rowling to say she hates writing.
As I flipped through the pages of my favorite athlete’s autobiography, I was shocked to find he despised the sport he had played his whole life, broken world records for, and most importantly to me, the game for which I admired his dedication, his token rebellion, and his spirit.
How was I to know it was a sport forced onto him by his father? That he too, along with so many other children, was a victim of the absence of choice?
Amidst our cross-cultural special feature, it seems pertinent to point out that parenting, just like love, may not be all that different across cultures.
A few pieces taken from this must-read autobiography, Open, by Andre Agassi:
“I’m seven years old, talking to myself, because I’m scared, and because I’m the only person who listens to me. Under my breath I whisper: Just quit, Andre, just give up. Put down your racket and walk off this court, right now…Doesn’t that sound nice? Wouldn’t that feel like heaven, Andre? To just quit? To never play tennis again?
But I can’t. Not only would my father chase me around the house with my racket, but something in my gut, some deep unseen muscle, won’t let me. I hate tennis, hate it with all my heart, and still I keep playing, keep hitting all morning, and all afternoon, because I have no choice…and I keep playing, and this gap, this contradiction between what I want to do and what I actually do, feels like the core of my life.”
“My father likes to shoot the hawks with his rifle. Our house is blanketed with his victims, dead birds that cover the roof as thickly as tennis balls cover the court. My father says he doesn’t like hawks because they swoop down on mice and other defenseless creatures. He can’t stand the thought of something strong preying on something weak…Of course he has no qualms about preying on me, no trouble watching me gasp for air on his nook. He doesn’t see the contradiction…He doesn’t realize that I’m the most defenseless creature in this godforsaken desert.”
“No one ever asked me if I wanted to play tennis, let alone make it my life. In fact, my mother thought I was born to be a preacher. She tells me, however, that my father decided long before I was born that I would be a professional tennis player…She tells me that when I was still in the crib, my father hung a mobile of tennis balls above my head and encouraged me to slap at them with a ping-pong paddle he’d taped to my hand.”
