How Tennis Can Jumpstart Your Post-50 Social Life
Yes, even if you’ve never swung a racquet
Finding it hard to make new friends as you get older?
What if I told you that one of the best ways to get and stay fit after 50 — playing tennis just a few times a week — is also a *complete* slam dunk for boosting your social life, too?
It happened for me, and it can happen for you, too — even if you’ve never swung a racquet and couldn’t pick 22 x Grand Slam champion Rafael Nadal out of a police lineup.
(JK. “Rafa” is waaaaay too much of an upstanding global citizen to run into trouble with the cops, or whatever Spanish sports legends call them.)
From City Slicker to Total Tennis Nut
So here’s my tennis “newbie to nut” story in a nutshell…
Relocating to Florida in my early 50s, after 30+ years in the concrete jungle of New York City and a 24/7 job in magazine editorial, I had a few life skills to catch up on, namely cooking and driving.
You know those urban legends about young Manhattan career women using the kitchen cabinets in their microscopic apartments to store their shoes and sweaters?
Totally true. New York is Take-Out Town. Not cooking is the norm.
As for driving, I did it maybe once every summer, way out on a dirt road in the Hamptons while no one was looking. Sure I had a license, but I mostly just made sure it didn’t lapse so I wouldn’t have to repeat the trauma of taking that gnarly nail-biter of a road test again.
Today, as a resident of artsy St. Petersburg (aka “the Brooklyn of the Sunshine State”), I’ve completely nailed cooking and driving. Well, at least by my cheerfully low standards. I feel confident and really enjoy both.
But as great as all that is, I feel like I’ve seriously moved the needle on my life for one reason and one reason only: I took up tennis.
Tennis has changed my life. Here’s how it can change yours.
- You’ll spend hours with perfect strangers. While that could sound scary, especially to the more naturally introverted among us, trust that it isn’t. You’ll either start out in group lessons (*highly* recommended) or meet fellow novices via apps like Play Your Court, because the beauty of tennis is that you can’t go it alone. At the very least, you’ll be playing singles. With doubles, which is much easier on your body in your 50s btw, you’ll be forced to interact with three actual living humans you may not know. With all the chit-chat that goes down during a two-hour match, you’ll definitely start forming bonds.
- You’ll build really strong conflict-resolution skills. During a match, it’s extremely likely that there will be at least one dispute over whether a ball has landed outside the designated lines. Losing track of the score is another not-so-awesome thing that happens a lot on the court, especially among senior players. Both of these matters need to be resolved fairly and amicably, and being forced to learn and practice solid tennis etiquette really helps you flex your friend-making muscles.
- You’ll find joy in growing your game together. After I exited the newbie-player stage and my game got better, I was eventually added to several weekly Evites with the more experienced players at my racquet club. While that’s been a boost to my ego, especially after allll the dough I’ve spent on lessons, there’s zero question that I’m closer to the female players I started out with than the “cool kids” who finally let me share their court. I feel super blessed to say that our core group quickly took our friendship off the courts and now regularly hangs with each other in non-tennis settings. In fact, a group of us is headed to Paris this October to celebrate two 60th birthdays. I have tennis — and only tennis — to thank for that.
When she isn’t smacking the daylights out of fuzzy yellow tennis balls, Dana Wood contributes to The New York Post, Insider’s Guide to Spas, The Wall Street Journal, Town & Country and several other publications and digital platforms. You can see view her body of work at danawoodwriter.com.