Great Circle

One of my pet hates with my own society is its increasing tendency to play the blame game:

• “Something went wrong in my life. Whose fault is it?”
• “I didn’t get what I wanted; who can I make pay?”
• “Yes, I’m a bad-tempered egotistical pain-in-the-rear, but if you want to complain, go talk to my parents; I’m their handiwork.”
• “No, I didn’t make a mistake, it happened because I wasn’t trained properly or superbised”
• “SuperBised?? See I can’t even spell because no teacher took the time to help me do it propally!!”

and blah blah blah, on it goes.

The natural follow-on for many people unfortunately is “Who can I sue?” But I digress ….

Wayne Arthurs is a breath of fresh air for me. He is an older tennis player (Yeh! 35 is sooooo old - but then again he’s the oldest guy in this year Australian Open); as an older player, he’s still giving it his best shot to do as well as he can.  

But he’s also self-defined, circumspect and a gentleman.

Here’s what I mean. A simple injection for pain relief caused him (to quote a journalist)

“more hurt than he could ever have imagined. It got him bundled out of the Australian Open as his biggest moment in tennis beckoned.  Arthurs’ relief from nagging pain in his hip turned to heartache when he became one of the one-in-1000 patients to suffer an adverse reaction to the medication. His muscles went into spasm and he lost control of his right leg.”

Imagine it. You’re psyched up, ready to go, wondering if this your last hurrah and how far you can take it, and then 3 games in, you lose all feeling in one of your legs.

And so he retires from the match. Soon, he’s in the press conference, presumably still smarting emotionally from this blow to his career. 

When asked the typically journalistic question, “Do you put the blame on anybody” (which translated means, “here’s your chance, point the finger and give us a sensational by-line” ), Arthurs replies sincerely:

“I don’t blame the doctor, no. I’ve been told it’s a one-in-a-thousand thing. I’ve reacted to it like one in a thousand person would. I’m not putting blame on anybody.”

It may have gone unnoticed by many people, but for that answer and that attitude (if not for anything else, Wayne), my hat is off to you. You are a champion and role model and I wish you the kind of meaningful success in the year ahead that more than makes up for your loss.

What a great Australian.