Mayhem, blood at Hardie Park tennis courts in Cayucos

February 25, 2024

Dell Franklin

By DELL FRANKLIN

Editor’s Note: The following series, “Life in Radically Gentrifying Cayucos by the Sea,” to be posted biweekly includes the notes, thoughts, and opinions of an original American voice: author Dell Franklin. 

Franklin’s memoir, “The ballplayer’s Son” is currently on Amazon.

Since the Monte Young tennis courts in Morro Bay are locked up indefinitely due to the storm knocking over the fencing, on a Saturday morning at around 8:30, my tennis partner Ethan and I showed up at the Hardie Park courts in Cayucos. These courts and the background are inferior to Monte Young, and it is almost always windier, especially on mornings.

But we were thankful to have a court and perfect weather after a week of rain as we commenced warming up on the non-pickleball court, when a great big shiny pickup rolled up and a wholesome young family—slender, athletic, pretty blond wife; slim, athletic husband; and three blond children, all around 5 or 6—fairly leaped out of the truck, the couple holding tennis rackets, the kids with various toys and balls and one of those racing cars a tot can scoot around in and pretend he’s at the Indianapolis Speedway.

Ethan and I didn’t say anything about this golden couple ignoring tennis etiquette by allowing their revved-up children to play inside the cage. We weren’t at a country club.

When we waved at them, they ignored us. The couple immediately began swatting the ball around, athletic, intense, but unskilled, keeping score, while the children made a play area of things.

We were, again, thankful to have a court to play on and were soon involved in long rallies. At one point, while going for a ball, I dodged the little blond boy tearing past me in his car and almost twisted an ankle, and finally the mother ordered the boy not to run his little car on our side of the court.

I quickly suggested to the mother that the children play outside the court so as to avoid a collision where somebody might be injured. Both parents ignored me. They were extremely zeroed in on their competition.

We kept hitting–bad tennis etiquette be damned. We were having some long demanding rallies that were totally gratifying as well as taxing. Our plan is always to just rally and rally and rally until exhaustion takes over, which arrives first in my case since I am 18 years older than Ethan.

In fact, we were in one of our best, longest rallies of the day, or any day, when the racing car slammed into my shins, nearly knocking me over as the kid went flying and the car broke up into segments. The wife dashed over, the father standing speechless on his side of the net while the wife apologized and asked if I was okay.

Then she looked down and saw that both my shins were were gashed while blood streamed down to my sweat socks.

“Oh my, you’re bleeding,” she said.

“Yes,” I said, “I am old and my skin is thin and easily torn when rammed by mini cars.”

The…