There has been tennis, tennis and more tennis happening in my house this week. Tennis watching on the tele that is, well, it is the US Open after all, with a bevy of excellent players from the US crafting some stunning matches, 25 citizens competing this year. To be fair, there are players representing dozens of countries, coming together here as friendly competitors despite politics or national differences.  Watching these young athletes is pure joy and absolutely inspiring, yet I found myself ruminating over the term “unforced error.” Commentators throw out the term with no thought over its brutal implication. The error is yours. You should have made the shot, but you didn’t. You are the only cause of your losing game. Brutal, right?

During this East Coast crushing heatwave we have been keeping the summer dinner plates happening, in front of the TV most every night, catching those players swinging in the high temperatures like gladiators fighting with all their might. Sure there are plenty of forced errors, but when the tennis gets real tough, hour after hour, the unforced errors pile high. I found myself wondering what it would be like if someone called out my mis-steps with such a candid appraisal. Hoping for the best, say at work, you take a risk, but nope, you bang the ball right into the net, another unforced error staring at you instead of success. In my line of work, that of the high school teacher, there is mostly praise for even the whisper of effort given by students. But how might the whole scenario play out if unforced errors were called out for the whole world to acknowledge? Perhaps a school isn’t the best comparison, how about if our politicians who set out to lie and misappropriate facts were calmly called out by commentators and we just watched the points tally? I like to think of myself as walking through life doing my best, but errors, not caused by anyone but myself, my own lack of judgment, my own ill-conceived choices, or my own poor skills do dictate the days and months and years piling up. This tennis watching has made me question much about how we gloss over our own ills. Do you learn from them, or develop a pattern? Awe, a coach might be handy to sort out all our own doorstops.

Mistake is at the core of this heatwave, at least most likely. Humans after all have brought our Earth and whole universe into chaos. We are the reason that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases have been released into the atmosphere, heating the planet until a near breaking point. This error is clearly unforced and most damaging. Here, in my small slice of living, I have water to dive into, and forests to provide a cooling shade, but it’s been a hell of a week keeping teens engaged in an old not air-conditioned school. Which leads me to pie. Yes, pie. Peach pie. My treat. I don’t pretend it’s the very best, but the peaches are especially sweet and delicious this year, and baking one is a sort of yearly tradition. Another unforced error, this inferior pie? Perhaps, but still a good one considering it involves peaches. I’ll own this error.