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JULY 4TH, YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT
Well and then there was also the little curved patterning, resembling the wavelike indentation on the surface of a muffin you can see when you peel off the thin paper cup in which it has been baked, pressed by your sweatband into the skin of your forehead and wrists (or one or the other, depending on where you prefer to wear your sweatband; you can’t do without one in a climate like that of Boston in the summer), for all the sweating makes your skin sustainedly so damp that it causes the same effect as a prolonged warm-water bath would. It makes the skin all grey and wrinkly and soft like a sponge. Hal knew all this through experience. He knew Pemulis knew it, too. The difference between the two of them, in terms of tennis skill, was borne not out of the amount factual knowledge possessed by either boy per se, but out of something far more complex, something Gerhardt Schtitt would sometimes call das Ding.[1] According to Schtitt, Hal possessed das Ding.
It was on. Round three of John (“No Relation”) Wayne VS Hal Incandenza. The sun had long since passed the zenith of the sky above the ETA court 6 in Enfield, Boston, looking down the hill at the Commonwealth Avenue, a safe distance away from the asbestos mines of Quebec, a world in a square underneath Schtitt’s delicate pin-headed shadow. The match had been going for a good 100 minutes or so, and they were starting to get to the point in a skilled junior level[2] tennis match where the players’ movements become increasingly routine as the fatigue sets in, leading to a sharp rise in the likelihood of making so-called ‘dumb’, i.e., relatively easily avoidable mistakes.[3] They both knew Hal was going to lose, although it didn’t matter much at this point. It was just for practice, anyway, and also Wayne was the best-ranked ETA junior and didn’t lose like, ever.
A complex, diffuse Thing one carries underneath one’s skin, an unconscious Wille[4] embedded in every gesture, informing every movement. Something very delicate that in absence of cultivation will pretty much just about shrivel up and die. Something fleeting and perishable, certainly. Schtitt liked to make a point of the perishability of das Ding.
They were really going at it now, the two of them. Do not think that even a practice match is to be taken lightly at the level of the 18-year-old ETA A juniors. Sweat running down their temples like little Alpine rivers in the spring. The stench of Lemon Pledge pretty ubiquitous now in every sense, unavoidable even when breathing exclusively through the mouth. At a certain point, the sweat glands in all the usual places get sort of overwhelmed, and sweat starts to emerge out of places that usually do not produce noticeable amounts of sweat, like the calves and the arms, just the surface of them, appearing in little beads that then get wiped on whatever other body part happens to touch that part of the skin, which always feels awfully gross. Das Ding is not just youth and the supreme physical capacity it grants, Schtitt emphasizes, for otherwise it would be impossible for some junior tennis players to have it and others not to. It is not just der Wille, either. You cannot will yourself into having it if you do not have it. Calling it simply ‘talent’ would be oversimplifying, too, however. According to deLint, who struggles perhaps the most with regurgitating this particular ‘Schtittism’ into a more comprehensible form for the students, it (= das Ding) is some sort of a combination of inborn talent, acquired skill, determination, and the sheer luck of happening to be in such a mindset that allows one to control all of the aforementioned qualities and direct them towards a definite goal, a single white spot inside one’s consciousness, and to stand right on top of that very spot, managing that delicate balance. An overdose of iron supplements can make you sweat blood.
Hal was losing, and he knew it, but he didn’t really care. The realization (= that he didn’t in fact care) came to him sometime around the first round, when he lost a point that wasn’t particularly easy, and so it’s not like it was an embarrassing loss, but the point wasn’t a totally impossible one, either, and that’s when it hit him. That he didn’t care if he lost. As a skilled junior player with a potential future making serious $ in the Show, it makes him a little scared.
Yet he doesn’t stop. He keeps hitting the ball. A carefully tuned machine, he runs on, just like the thousands of TPs turned on in the night of Boston, 15th of March YG, will keep transmitting the signal even long after there is not a single sentient soul watching the broadcast.
☺
“Remember when we used to celebrate Independence Day?”
“No. Not really, no.”
The locker rooms are quiet, their air dry. The difference between the inside and outside temp is enough to make you shiver just stepping in. Hal pushes his right bicep with his left hand, detaching the Pledge cast. Michael Pemulis is wearing a T-shirt that says [INSERT FUNNY JOKE][5]. Indefinite sounds coming from the hallway temporarily catch the boys’ attention. Turns out it’s nothing. Pemulis raises his left foot, resting its ankle on his right knee, and briefly examines the side of his shoe for any stains.
“I remember once, when we still lived in our old house and were getting ready to celebrate, just the five of us, because this was obviously before the Academy as well, and although I don’t have many memories from that house, I remember this very vividly. I must’ve been something like four. Which is the average age for when people’s earliest memories start to form in Western societies, by the way.”
With each round of toweling, Hal’s hair is starting to look less like a wet succulent plant and more like human hair. Pemulis has come to the locker rooms after Hal’s practice match to ‘discuss some matters’ as he puts it. Nobody knows where Wayne is; he simply scurried off after his victory, barely leaving behind a dusty trace.
“Anyway, all I remember about that Independence Day was that at some point right before the dinner Orin wet his pants accidentally and tried to blame it on Mario.”
“Why are you telling me th– Wait a minute, Orin tried to blame Mario for wetting Orin’s pants?”
“Yeah. He claimed he had tried to give him a real big hug, unaware that Mario just at that moment had to go, and unable to correctly communicate to Orin that he had to go, Mario had peed his pants and consequently wetted Orin’s.”
“Without wetting his own?”
Hal shrugs. “The Moms believed it.”
“That’s surprising.”
“No comment from dad.”
“As always.”
“He had the glass pretty perpetually in his hand at that point.”
“A standard piece of Incandenza family drama.”
“The hunting rifle above the mantel.”
“You’re still not over your dad.”
“Hey Mikey, how was Independence Day back at your place, anyway?”
Pemulis has nothing that he could throw, so he just flips Hal off with both hands. His arms have those creepy little goosebump type bumps all over.
“You know how Orin sometimes accidentally calls him the Sad Stork? Like, Sad instead of Mad.”
“Why did Orin wet his pants, anyway, wasn’t he like, thirteen?”
“Twelve.”
“If I was him, I would’ve probably lied, too.”
“By the way,” Hal says, “have you ever noticed how, in the second act of Tosca, Spoletta, who is the right-hand man of the evil police chief Scarpia, pleads specifically to Saint Ignatius, going all ‘Sant’Ignazio m’aiuta’, when he’s afraid of Scarpia?”
“How could I not have noticed.”
“And have you considered that Saint Ignatius is not some kind of a martyr who withstood horrific tortures, but instead is known solely for being the founder of the Society of Jesus, A.K.A. the Jesuits? You know, the Jesuits whose credo is to pretty much detach themselves from any personal moral judgements, in order to fully serve God? Who were an important factor in the Counter-Reformation? Who quarreled church-internally with the Jansenists in the 18th century? Whose name is the base of a pejorative verb referring to dubious conduct towards other persons, according to the Oxford English Dictionary?[6]”
“Man, the stuff you learn just by knowing you.”
“Spoletta is a Jesuit.”
“So, you’re saying that the guy who acts as the pawn of some evil is a blind follower of his faith? I wonder what the composer might have wanted to say with this.”
“It’s not so simple. The Jesuits also hold a commitment to education and have a history of standing against oppressive governments in South America.”
Pemulis theatrically throws his hands into the air. “Praise God.”
“But like, an insane commitment to education. Something like 15 years to become a Jesuit brother. His name is Puccini, by the way. The composer’s.” Hal removes the tape from his ankle, and the watering of his eyes forces him to pause. “And they are all celibate during this time.”
Pemulis gives Hal a look, which he ignores.
“When you think about it, it’s not so different from us and what we’re doing here at ETA.”
“Except for the celibacy thing, you mean.”
“Aren’t you contradicting what you implied just a moment ago?”
“What did I imply, Hal?”
“…”
“What did I imply?”
“Don’t be dense.”
“All I’m saying is that nature will find a way,” Pemulis says, his voice carrying the kind of airy nonchalance only possible when you are going on eighteen and actively running from several facets of reality that are rapidly closing in from all sides all at once.
[1] Hal knows Ding just means ’thing’ in German. Pemulis does not. This is a difference in factual knowledge between them, and it exists due to the fact that Pemulis Does Not Give a Damn.
[2] The level which one European coach of a visiting team from the now unfortunately cancer-ridden since 1998 BS ‘Burned Milk Incident’ Norway had in his amusing non-native English called “pre-pro.” The Norwegian kids had had giant tumors protruding from various points in their bodies underneath their nicely knit traditional sweaters.
[3] At this level, there are actually no dumb mistakes in the same sense that a non-professional i.e., a hobbyist player might conceive a dumb mistake. That’s why you sometimes hear something akin to ’the pros make no mistakes’. This is in fact not true; the pros do make mistakes. It’s just that their mistakes are something very different from hobbyist mistakes, it’s like there is an entirely different level of pro mistakes that the pro mistakes are on, and that level is invisible to those who are not invested in the world of pro tennis.
[4] German; Schtitt’s term, meaning ’will’ in English.
[5] Yes, with brackets and all.
[6] Oxford English Dictionary, s.v. “Jesuit (v.),” YDAU, licensed for continentwide Interlace Telent cartridge release.a EXPLOIT THE LIMITLESS POSSIBILITY TO MAKE AND OVER-WRITE [sic.] YOUR OWN PERSONAL NOTATIONS, DIGITALLY.
a Additional RAM package not included. Ask your service provider or academic institution for more details.