When I was pregnant for a second time, I couldn’t fathom how my heart could expand big enough to love my new babies (yes, twins) as much as I loved our toddler daughter. Of course, then our twins were born, and I realized the heart is the most elastic of muscles because it swelled and filled with boundless love for all three of my kiddos. 

This was two decades ago ago, so why am I bringing this up now? To give insight into how this dedicated, longtime runner can feel equally passionate about pickleball. Loving one doesn’t mean I can’t love both. Maybe I’m paranoid but I sometimes feel that when I opine about pickleball, it seems I’m being a traitor to running. 

Karin, a new friend this year. We bonded over growing up on the East Coast

Just as I love each of my children for different reasons (Daphne sees connections where no one else does! Phoebe has the quickest wit of anyone I know! John possesses boundless empathy!), various sports feed my soul differently. Take running and pickleball: I approach both of them with a competitive fire, yet it doesn’t burn with the same way. While I very much want to win on the pickleball court, I also crave laughter. The more I laugh between points (heck, sometimes during points!), the more it feels like winning at pickleball. More than once I have left the court and headed home from playing at my health club because the players were all business and gruffness. Regardless of the score, it felt like losing, not winning.

Tammy digging for a shot 

When I run in a race, it’s myself against the clock. As I admitted in one of our books, I know my PR times—even if they are from years (um, a decade+) ago! Driving home from a pickleball session, on the other hand, I don’t know or even really care how many games I won or what the scores were. Instead, I’ll mentally replay a drop-shot I sprinted for then hit as a cross-court winner, or the lob that kissed the back line after arching over my opponents’ heads. 

The vast majority of my runs are now done solo, which suits me fine most of the time. Yet I only play doubles in pickleball—partly because singles pickleball is exhausting, but mainly because I love the camaraderie the sport fosters. And pickleball reminds me that everyone is trying their best. The other morning, I was playing with a woman I often play with—I’ll call her Mary—and she and I are often a force to be reckoned with on the courts. Yet that morning, Mary was having an off-day, her signature cross-court “dinks” going into the net and her usual laser-focused passing shots were landing out of bounds. I adore Mary so instead of frustration, I felt empathy. How could I be miffed at Mary when I knew she was trying her best and the pickleball-gods were just not smiling on her that day. 

My mood is truly this sunny on a pickleball court

Every pickleball game, like every run, is new and different. From my decades of running, I know it’s important to show up with a positive attitude and a sense that anything is possible. The court and the players might be the same as they were last Sunday, just like the 7-mile river loop still includes two bridges and a few quick hills, but the experience will be as fresh as my mind allows. 

In a way it’s like a family dinner: The pasta recipe might be the same one I often serve when our family of five sits down for a meal together, but the conversation will be different. It’s the love that stays the same.