Our Rocky Start...

About ten years ago, as naïve beginners, we entered a mixed doubles tournament. Our opening round opponents were Jerry, a man many years our senior, and his octogenarian female partner. Our singular goal was to hit some shots toward and over the net.

 They were experienced players.

No matter that the lady couldn't run; she set up camp at the net and killed all the drifting balls we lobbed in her direction. And Jerry’s returns were relentlessly unreachable. After the slaughter Jerry kindly offered us some playing tips and suggested lessons. Lessons and a decade of regular play have made us passable players.

Why we love it...

1. Competition

Rosemarie and I like competition! Some people eschew competitive activities, perhaps conflating the desire to win with hostility and aggression. We are peace loving people AND we love to win!

2.  Friendship

 Tennis has brought us a wealth of friendship.  There’s Kelly with her big heart, pirate’s curses, and debilitating outbreaks of laughter on the court; Gary’s pterodactyl shrieks when he misses a shot; and Martin bellowing “MARRRR-TIN!” when he flubs an easy one. There’s Patrick, Valerie, Jeff, Claire, Peter, Judy, Hugh, Lynn, Al, Andrew, Margaret, Kip, Sue, Rajesh, Stefan, Lioba, Josiah, Robert, Bill, Carmen, Caroline, Ian, Gabriel, Hanne, Ineke, Jeanne, Jeremy, Joan, Jim, Kyle, Mark, Michael, Penny, Rachel, Reg, Sheryl, Sid, Christie, Harry, Louise, Susanne, Terry, Tonya, and so many more!

3.  Our Wonderful Victoria Virtual Tennis Club - VVTC

We met most of our tennis friends through our amazing Victoria Virtual Tennis Club. We are “Virtual” in that we have no courts of our own. Instead, we play on Victoria’s great indoor and outdoor public courts.  Our website, http://vvtc.bc.ca/, is the hub of our tennis organization.  Check it out; it’s a marvel of accessible simplicity created by VVTC member and web wizard Mark Alldritt. Our VVTC “clubhouses” consist of the coffee shops we often gather at post-match and of each other’s homes (where we have great parties!)

VVTC membership is free and it’s is easy to sign up for on the website. We are over 200 strong and growing!

4.  Oh Yeah, and the Exercise Too

 Tennis keeps us active and fit even though it’s all fun and no work!

Alas, no Redemption

We’ve met scores of fine people across the net but, oddly, we never again played Jerry. Alas, there will be no redemption for Rosemarie and Tom from that geriatric schooling.

Lessons Anyone?

Please learn from our experience with Jerry and his partner; if you want to jump into tennis start with lessons. These three facilities offer fine beginner’s tennis lesson packages:

• Oak Bay Recreation: http://oakbay.ca/parks-recreation
• Cedar Hill Recreation: http://www.saanich.ca/parkrec/recreation/cedar.html)
• Panorama Recreation: http://www.crd.bc.ca/panorama/

Side with the Winners

You may or may not choose to play tennis. Perhaps golf, baseball, hockey, ping pong, badminton, bocce, Scrabble, bungy jumping, channel-surfing, or (you name it) is your game.  But in life we all must occasionally take the Real Estate playing field. Rosemarie and her team bring years of experience and success to winning at this game. Please do your house selling and/or hunting friends a favour and put them onto Coach Rosemarie!

Thank you for reading this blog and for visiting our website! And remember this;

LOVE means nothing in tennis!

              Nicolia                     Rosemarie                    Rhea        Tom             Alexis

What the Heck is this Thing?

It’s funny how it goes with the first time of doing an event. There’s really no tradition around it, no past experience to send us to:

A park to play: but it’s February and Victoria's parks are cold and muddy

A pub to celebrate: but that leaves out the kids

Camping!: see above re February, cold, & mud.

A vacation!: but this is only one day, or a long weekend at best.

An Oceanside walk? Family brunch? A family board game? Okay, now we’re getting closer.

Our Family

Our family (see our First Family Day photo above) consists of Rosemarie, Tom, and our three amazing daughters; Alexis, Nicolia, and Rhea.

Rhea, our youngest at 21, took the Family Day matter in hand. She pushed for us all to get together. This was not easy as Alexis & Nicolia live and work in Vancouver. The two were to sail over on an early ferry that morning; the rest of us would meet them at the dock and from there we were to go on a hike! That was the plan.

What We Actually Did.

Well, the ferry they got was not so early and Rosemarie and I had a lot of unavoidable work to do that morning. Rhea, newly a licensed driver, fetched her sisters and brought then home shortly after noon. And Alexis & Nicolia brought with them another plan. They led us on a walk downtown which brought us (surprise!) to a city sponsored Family Day free concert at Ship’s point.

One of the groups playing was Current Swell, a rising Victoria group that we all love and which is Rosemarie’s Current Favourite! Check them out at currentswell.com, I hope you’ll love them too! The misty rain let up during Current Swell’s awesome rockin’ set and we had a fabulous time.

The Icing on Our Family Day Cake

After the set we spotted Current Swell’s superb lead singer, Scott Stanton, on his way to the CD selling & signing tent and asked him to pose with Rosemarie. He was happy to oblige.

Sweet!!!!

Please send us a comment and tell us what you did for Family Day.

Rosemarie's here for you!

And if you have any ideas around Real Estate this Spring please don't hesitate to give Rosemarie a call at 250-592-4422, or email her at rosietherealtor@shaw.ca. People often think that they should know what they want to do and when they want to do it before they call a Realtor®. Rosemarie is happy just to sit with you, share her knowledge, and listen to your thoughts, whether or not these involve any immediate action.