Oh Brother

One of my brother's favorite things to do when he calls me at work is to yell "YOU'RE FIRED!!! LEAVE THE OFFICE IMMEDIATELY!" Then he starts cracking up at how funny he is while I sit there in silence, knowing that it's him. Seeing that it's been a year since he's left LA for school and not working or living near me anymore, I forgot how much I miss those little stupid things when he's back and up to his old tricks.

I was lucky enough to be his default plan tonight since he had to work late at his summer internship and miss his bschool function. After ten years of not picking up a racket, he decided to try tennis again this week. He was so confident he could beat me after playing for the first time on Sunday, we decided to head for the courts tonight. I am by no means a natural athlete, but tennis I can do.

The courts were crowded as usual and several others eyed us warily as we all waited for the first court to open up. Tennis court etiquette is a bit odd. Some people believe that you should take your best guess and choose a court that you think will free up first. Then you wait. But for just THAT court. Others (people who are nice and believe in fairness) think the person waiting the longest should get the first court that opens up. First come, first serve. My usual tennis buddy has gotten in shouting matches with people who either wouldn't leave after playing for more than an hour or those who try to poach our courts.

Tonight, after we had waited half an hour, a group of Chinese girls tried to poach our court after showing up just 2 minutes before the first court opened up. They claimed I could only wait for one court and that I was standing closer to the other ones. I would have stood my ground, but I didn't have to. My tall, imposing, stubborn as all hell of a brother walked over to the people leaving and to those girls, declaring that the court was ours. We were there first.

He turned to me and said "I'm not worried about this. The court is ours. I will sit on the floor of this court and throw tennis balls at them if I have to. I'm not leaving." Of course, we won. And I marveled that not only did I not have to stand up for my little brother a long time ago, he can stand up for me now.

When we started warming up, he confessed "Yeah, bullying a bunch of Asian girls off the court was easy. I don't know if I could have stood up to a bunch of big guys." Heh heh...

We were quite the sight on the court. Me hobbling around on my sore ankle, not able to chase down any balls, and him with no backhand swing to speak of. Kicked his ass 6-2. We drove down to pick up some sandwiches to eat at my place and looked at the family portraits I just picked up. We promised to play again next week. I look forward to it!