Thin skinned, literally and figuratively

I suspect I overreacted to something that a new participant said at our Wednesday clinic with George at the Holyoke Canoe Club.

When we were doing a drill where you slice the ball back and forth so that it stays inside the service box, she kept giving it the kind of slice more befitting a lob, sending it over my head. I let them go and by about the fourth time I said we're supposed to be keeping them in the box. Then she did it again. I said I can't jump for those and she stopped and asked, "Why?"

It would have been at the very least puzzling to the other people at our level in a fun clinic like that, and the next step up would be annoying. I reacted a step beyond that, getting defensive and mumbling to the person next to me hitting with a different person, "She should try having ......." Well you can fill in the rest.

He said I was doing great and to let it go, which I did, as soon as I looked at the sun sparkling on the river and switched to another hitting partner.

It obviously didn't fall unto the "stupid things people say to you when you have or have had cancer" category because she didn't know anything about me; rather it was just plain old "silly things people say" that don't deserve attention. But sometimes I go there without even realizing it.

I actually am running around well and had a good 6-3, 6-3 win my doubles partner Monday at Crosier Park in our Paper Dolls summer league game. We also won 4-0 when we played "for fun" after the match was over. (A team sweep!)

Since I'm getting a little tired of covering up with long sleeves plus pants under my skirt plus my sun-protection gloves, yesterday I took a break and wore a tank top instead of the long sleeves and ditched the long stretchy pants.

Afterwards I met some of the players for lunch at the Bueno Y Sano food truck in Holyoke. There was no shade, and so we sat at a picnic table under the hot midday sun. I didn't have anything long-sleeved with me, so I grabbed a striped beach towel still in the car from our Wellfleet trip. I'm sure I looked odd looking like that on Race Street where there was no beach, but nobody looked at me.

The light therapy makes my skin supersensitive, and my arms got sunburned.Today I was back in my long sleeves, hot but protected. It's a good thing I didn't go to Dana-Farber today because Ellen (the PA) would have something to say about it. She wants me to play indoors, but since everyone is outside and tennis is part of my self-prescribed health-care protocol, I'm just going to keep covering up, lathering on the sunscreen, and playing.