game. set. match. blog.

A perfect combination of violent action taking place in an atmosphere of total tranquility.
- Billie Jean King

It's that time of year again, right after my birthday, when the weather is still warm and I'm still arguing with people that summer isn't over - time for the US Open at the USTA in Flushing Meadows Corona Park, NY.

Accompanied by my tennis partners in crime, Alex and my mom, I took on the heat, the crowds, the merchandise, the free giveaways, the exorbitant food court prices, John McEnroe, and, of course, world-class tennis.


...okay, maybe not McEnroe per se, but he was in the vicinity.

And, as per usual, I got to thinking: Why am I not out there playing some world-class tennis, too? Well, let's see...A lack of a coach in more than five years maybe? The lack of a steady partner with whom to play? Not enough self-discipline to work on my serve six days a week? The fact that I'm too busy trying to write a book?

All these things, and perhaps more, are definitely good reasons, but not anything that can't be remedied.

So, as of today, I've gotten myself a coach, and I start lessons the first weekend in October. It might not sound like much, but it's a start. It's getting back out on the court. It's that competitive edge flaring up again. It's Varsity tennis all over again, sans the green pleated skirt.

Oh yeah, and it's also dawned on me that next to writing and films, the next thing I'm probably most knowledgeable and passionate about is this very sport, from the history of its snooty (and British) beginnings to the greatest athletes to play the game to those technical scoring intricacies that baffle the uninitiated tennis viewer. I think the lightbulb went on when I found myself for the fourth time this week, not to mention how often in all my 24 years (did I mention it was my birthday??), trying once again to explain to someone the very logical, quite brilliant scoring methodology behind the game. But to no avail. Maybe I'm just not explaining it well enough, I found myself thinking, but God knows, I've tried. So I pondered and I pondered and finally came to the conclusion that I might better express myself in writing than in frustrated, fast-paced, out-of-breath spoken words. Maybe I'll get Alex, my mom, and my sisters (my dad has yet to ask) to understand how to keep score soon enough -

racquetgirl.blogspot.com

Game. Set. Match. Blog...All tennis, all the time, by a tennis player who dreams of US Open glory.

Interesting, if nothing else. The start of something truly unique, most definitely.

happy birthday!!

Writing is the best way to talk without being interrupted.
- Jules Renard

August 24, 1984...I showed up.

And here we are, 24 years later, still celebrating =)

flash fiction...round 1

Writing is the only thing that, when I do it, I don't feel I should be doing something else.
- Gloria Steinem

So the writing competition website, NYC Midnight, that brought me 2nd place glory several months ago with their 2008 Short Story Challenge is back with yet another competitive gem - the 2008 Creative Writing Championships.

In this competition, there are four rounds, and each writer is guaranteed to compete in at least the first two. You have two days (from Friday midnight to Sunday midnight) to complete a 1,000-word story, abiding by the genre, location, and object requirements for your specific heat. In a few weeks, we find out how we placed, and depending on what that is, we are assigned a number of points, which ultimately help decide the grand prize winner.

Below is my first submission, written in about three hours, even though, yes, I had a whole two days to do it. Alas, I'm a busy person =P And yes, you might ask, but Melissa, where are the other stories you've submitted to competitions and written about? Why haven't you posted them yet? Truth is, I've never really considered it until now. So...here we are:

Title: Framed
Synopsis: High atop the city, boredom turns to panic, actions are called into question, and a camera captures the tragedy of life in all its hi-def glory.
Genre: Open
Location: Rooftop of a skyscraper
Object: Video camera

By Melissa C. Navia

Matthew felt his eyelids getting heavy as he stared blankly out the towering windows of his father’s office. Fifty-seven floors up might have garnered him a bright, unobstructed view of the city on a hot Friday morning, but it still gave him nothing to do. His head began to nod off to the side. A black, compact video camera lay cradled in his hands.

It was summer. The temperature outside had been consistently scorching for the past week, and today was no different. If anything, it was worse. The air conditioning was at full volume. He had already heard some women in business skirts and blouses complaining about the chilly blast. But 15-year-old Matthew, in khaki shorts and a striped polo shirt, was content with the cold temperature lulling him to sleep. He went back to wondering why he had followed his father, who he hadn’t seen all morning, into work that day.

“Stop having so much fun!”

Matthew looked up. Staring down at him was one of the company’s younger employees. Pinstriped pants, wrinkled white shirt, messy brown hair, and a loosened striped tie. It had already been a long day.

“Scott Lawrence,” he said smiling. “You’re Peterson’s son, right?”

“Yeah, Matt,” Matthew responded dryly, “and yeah, it’s that much fun.”

“Sorry kid. We’re not crazy about being here either. Economy’s been real flighty. Stockbrokers get the worst of it,” Lawrence explained.

Trying to express his disinterest with the conversation, Matthew fidgeted with the video camera in his lap.

“Cool camera!” Lawrence tried again. “Canon? The new one? Expensive stuff.”

“Yeah, it comes with a bunch of different filming modes and upgrades,” Matthew acknowledged, turning the camera around.

“Oh my god!” Lawrence cried.

“Eh, it’s okay. No big deal,” Matthew countered. But when he looked up to explain, Lawrence was already running toward the windows—along with the rest of the office. Matthew spun around in his seat to see what caused the panic, but he heard everyone’s cries first, and he already knew.

Somebody was on the ledge.

Who was it? Anthony Radale from down the hall, someone shouted. What do we do? Somebody call the police! But what do we do? Don’t bang on the window! Open up a window? Get him inside.

Uncertainty mounted, and the orders being given out escalated in number. Several employees, Lawrence included, rushed to start the rescue operation while they waited for police.
But Matthew couldn’t wait. He clutched his camera and ran in the opposite direction. They were three floors from the roof of the building, and since he had been little, Matthew knew exactly where the exit doors stood.

Out of breath and panting, he burst through them into the day’s suffocating humidity, despite the windiness of the rooftop. He hurried over to the building’s edge and looked out over the protective barrier.

There he was, the man balancing on the ledge of the 57th floor. Matthew tore off the video camera’s lens cover, wound the camera strap around his wrist, held his arms out over the barrier, and clicked Record.

The noisy breeze around him dissipated, leaving just the sounds of the rotating lens. Matthew stared intently at the screen. He was filming at 30 frames per second. Perfect for YouTube. He smiled. Who would’ve thought? No news cameras, helicopters, reporters—he was the first one to the scene. Settling on a good bird’s eye view, Matthew lay down on his stomach and steadied his hand. The camera picked up the noise below.

Lawrence and other employees—Was that his father he heard?—were urging the man to come back in so they could talk. They said they were worried. They didn’t want him to get hurt. They understood. They just wanted him to step back inside. They said it wasn’t worth it. Matthew listened in silence.

The man on the ledge said nothing. He just stood there. Was he trembling? Matthew zoomed in tighter and scowled. He still only saw the back of the guy’s head. The monotony of the shot was beginning to irk him.

“C’mon,” he muttered under his breath, “say something…do something.”

For a moment, Matthew glanced away from the miniature screen and looked further below. A large crowd was already forming. Still no news vans.

He took a risk and panned away from the man to the people, simultaneously sliding the zoom toggle and pushing it to the max. Within seconds, they were in focus. Far away, but in focus. Matthew’s eyes narrowed as he strained to look closer. Were they celebrating? He swore they looked excited. He closed his eyes and opened them again. Were they yelling at Anthony to jump?

Shuddering, Matthew slid the zoom toggle again in the opposite direction. The image in the screen quickly ascended the height of the building. But just as it reached the top, a blur in the corner caused a guttural noise to escape from the back of Matthew’s throat.

It was Anthony. Out of focus. Trembling. And staring at him.

Matthew’s hands froze, and so the camera lens obediently adjusted, bringing Anthony into focus. He continued to stare up at the camera, at Matthew. His now visible face was red and tear stained, but his expression was vacant, his eyes were cold.

And then he fell—forward and fast, still looking up. Screams escaped from the windows. People cleared the sidewalk. Matthew’s hands jerked to life, and he pulled the camera in over the barrier. He scampered backwards, his hands burning on the black rooftop floor. They were going to come looking for him, he realized. They were going to want to know what Anthony saw before he died.

And so when the officers, the stockbrokers, and the father burst through the rusted metal doors, they thought they would find something worthy of a man’s last look. But what they found was only a pale young boy, his forehead sweating, his mouth trembling, his arms hanging limp, and a shattered camera at his feet.

out for adventure

Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.
- Helen Keller

So it's been a few weeks since I last posted, but with good reason. It's been a crazy busy summer packed with writing, going to the beach, working out, doing Bikram yoga, the Olympics, movie watching, test driving cars, visiting parks, taking pictures, planning parties, cleaning, online magazine launching, chilling, and, oh yes, one very memorable Adventure Race, courtesy of Genesis Adventures.


To get the full specifics on it, I'd like to direct you to Alex's website, where he offers a minute-by-minute rundown of the the sweat, the pain, the excitement - 6 hours and 57 minutes worth (including a picture of one of the race map that on several occasions proved useless).

alexanderkblog.wordpress.com

The race took place on Saturday, August 2, in Allamuchy (pronounced with the "ch" sound, not the "k" sound...because I can only be corrected so many times) Mountain State Park, NJ, and according to everyone there, from the coordinator of the event to the adventure race veterans, it turned out to be one of the hardest races on record. The race results, which we got a few days later, proved it, seeing as how about 10 teams were assigned a "DNF" - did not finish.

Alex and me, however, aka Team Vigilant Monkey, did finish in just under 7 hours, starting at 9:00 AM and finishing three minutes before the official race cut-off time of 4:00 PM.

To sum up, the race was awesome, and really nothing like we expected. We actually (if you faithful blog readers can remember) took a prep course/daylong camp about two months ago during the last adventure race to better understand what we we were getting ourselves into, in Wawayanda State Park, NJ.

But you know how you study and study for an exam like the SAT or GRE, take practice tests, go over review questions, do the repetitive, straightforward problems, and still end up convinced that the actual test is more difficult than what you were told to go over? That's kind of exactly how this ended up. Consisting of three sections, kayaking, hiking, and mountain biking, this was the breakdown between the two locations -

In Wawayanda, we were on a lake, a big, calm enclosed lake, where lily pads and flowers were in abundance, on a hot, summer's day.

In Allamuchy, we were on a river, a tight, muddy, shallow-and-then-deep-when-you-least-expect-it, fly-infested, rocky, muddy (did I mention that?) river. Oh yeah, and there were waterfalls. I was covered in crap less than five minutes into the kayak portion of the race. Our paddles picked up more mud, seaweed, mulch, rocks, and unidentifiable brown stuff than I ever even thought sat at the bottom of a river.

Oh, and it was anything but sunny. Kayaking back to the transition point, the heavens opened up and unleashed all the rain that it hadn't unleashed all summer. And thunder. And lightning. When we got out at one point, thinking we should run with the kayak back to camp, we came up in a really thick part of the forest, where walking, let alone running, was out of the question. So we retraced our steps, but once at the river, we realized one of the paddles went missing, so I ran back into the forest to find it. And it might sound silly, but the day had already gotten so Lord of the Rings on me, that I actually entertained the possibility that river trolls had stolen the paddle out of the kayak when Alex was pulling it back, just so that one of us could go back to retrieve it, only to get snatched up, leaving the other alone on the river. Yes, the writer in me was still hard at work...

The kayak portion alone claimed two teams, who ended up stuck out there and had to drop out of the race.

Less than 2 hours for us, however, and we were back at the transition area.

Back to Wawayanda, where hiking was, literally, like a walk in the park. There were open forest areas, nicely marked paths, sights to be seen, and, of course, sun.

Allamuchy - everything was soaked. We were soaked. Our clothes were soaked. The forest was soaked. Any sort of traction that existed ever went out the window. Trails - non-existent. Checkpoints - few and far in between. The hiking was really what either made or broke teams. To be more exact, it was the dreaded Checkpoint 5 somewhere on some mythic stone wall that left people lost, confused, wandering and annoyed. It's funny how much a foggy compass, a wet map, and being surrounded by endless trees can really put a relationship to the test. Plus, there were ruins (and the river we kayaked on went through a historic, closed-down town) that I didn't even give a second look at - just to show you how frustrated Checkpoint 5 made me.

But we persevered and made it out of the forest in relatively sane condition. Back at the transition area, we grabbed our bikes, took note of how many bikes were still in their stands (thus the number of racers still in the woods), and took off on the third and last portion of the race.

Wawayanda - dirt bike paths, sun, some sort of direction.

Allamuchy - rocks, rocks, and more rocks. Wet rocks. Large rocks. Hidden rocks. The term for such bike paths are "bony," and these were up there with the boniest. It was on these paths that we met up with many teams still fuming from Checkpoint 5.

At about 3:30 PM, Alex and I started heading back to the transition point to cross the finish line. We had veered off the map for about thirty minutes prior to that, leaving us lacking in the the last few checkpoints (along with a good deal of other teams), but reinvigorated as well. The time to ourselves, in the middle of some of the coolest woods I've ever seen, by the largest boulder I've ever seen, was much needed and appreciated. It was the perfect note to end our race.

Well, actually, the bell they clanged for us as we crossed the finish line made a pretty good ending note, too. Right after we finished, I asked if there were any teams still out there, to which the coordinator responded with a laugh and an, "Of course!!" And I smiled, because it meant we did pretty darn good.

So that's the story. That was our race. More than once throughout the day my father's voice echoed in my head as he asked, "And why are you doing this again?" And more than once, I wondered the same thing myself. I ended up with cuts on my feet (most from wading in the river, pulling the kayak through gunk) and my legs (most from the hiking, where I think I must have brushed by every thorn and sharp twig in the whole forest), with pain in parts of my body that I didn't even know were capable of aching, with squishy socks that never really dried, with a river gunk-smeared bandana that attracted pesky insects throughout the whole race, with the realization that giving me a map does as much good as leaving the map at home, and with knee pain (there were few without a limp in their step at the end of the day).

Will we do it again? Of course we will. September, to be exact. To which my dad would ask, why is that? Because we have to. Because it was awesome. It was exhilirating. It was a challenge. It was a hardship. It was something unlike I've ever done before. It was 7 hours of realizing that if you want to, you will.

And then there's Checkpoint 5. Somewhere, at some point, some day, there'll be another Checkpoint 5. And we'll find it.

We have to.