Gutter - all Sounds

We're having a big meltdown here. All the snow from winter is rapidly disappearing. Last night in bed I could hear the gutters groaning from being overworked. A couple of squirrels were tapping on the gutters. It sounded like Morse code.

I kept thinking about gutters because the noises were so loud and that reminded me of a wheelchair tennis match I played in Lancaster Pennsylvania. I was in the middle of a three-hour match when a bug flew into my right eye. I had my tennis racket taped on so there was no way I could get my glasses off without bonking myself in the head. Since the person helping me had gone on a break, I played on without depth perception.

I went back on the court and tennis balls flew by. I took shots at them but kept missing. My opponent began to hit harder and harder. The score became ugly. I reached up as far as I could toward my eye but only managed to get sunburn lotion in the eye for the bug to swim in. My eye began to sting and tear as people watching yelled encouragement at me.

For some reason I thought about Monica Seles and her grunting. I had to do something to distract my opponent and I realized that grunting might feel pretty good. So the next time I hit the ball I let out a guttural sound that was so loud it surprised me. My opponent missed the ball. I served again and let out another grunt. She missed again. I rolled towards the ball grunting and sounding like a warrior at battle.

In tennis matches, each player not only watches the ball, but they study their opponent. I knew that she knew something had changed for me. But she wasn't sure what was going on. And that was the only thing in my favor.

Somehow it worked. She stopped hitting balls so fast and peered over at me quizzically wondering why I was grunting. Maybe she was just entertained by the whole thing. But it bought me enough time until my helper returned and we were able to get everything out of my eye during a break. I didn't win the match but at least kept the score close.

Guttural sounds.

I guess I'm lucky the squirrels don't know about that.