Climbing like Sharapova.

I was introduced to Sharapova* while cycling in France. We never met before in the Netherlands nor in Scotland. I guess she doesn’t care for the sea or the hills aren’t steep and/or long enough when walking. Perhaps it is a climate thing, it’s just not warm enough in Scotland. Maybe it’s the combination of the two. I don’t know…. But now I know Sharapova is a part of me when cycling up a steep hill at temperatures above 26 degrees Celcius, and when I’m at the end of my cycling trip. When I’m crawling so very slowly up the hill, bees, butterflies, and other nasty insects are gaining on me, and when I’m sweating buckets…. Sharapova unleashes, I can’t help it, and I moan, groan and sigh my way up the hill. Every turn of my bike paddle is accompanied by moaning and sighing. Mouth open. Effortlessly. And when going down the hill, I lock her up in her cage again. Only to come out on another climb.

It’s a good thing the roads are relatively quiet, there is no one to hear my Sharapova’s except Alexander. It actually sounds a bit indecent. The good people of France must be in shock when they hear me passing by behind their hedges or gates. They might have very other ideas of the goings-on with this huffing and puffing girl. It is quite embarrassing so I try to hide my Sharapova when passing people in the street but she doesn’t always cooperate.

I know things will not get any better this summer with either the temperature en the steepness of the hills. Sharapova and I will have to become friends. I will have to accept her presence whenever I climb a hill. In order to archive this goal, I turned her into a verb, ‘I just Sharapovaed my way up the hill.’  The verb makes it more normal and acceptable, don’t you think? 

*) Sharapova is a tennis player. Her nickname is ‘The queen of scream’.She was the first woman to moan and groan every time she hit the ball. There are more tennis girls now with the same verbal outings when hitting a ball.

Charlotte Gannet (who is never going to any country south of the Netherlands during the months of June, July, and August.)