The best is yet to come ...

Our house guest Ray has now left us to go and stay with some mutual friends for a couple of days before setting off for the north of England to meet up with another friend and visit some steam railways.

When he walked through our door at 6.15 am on Monday morning, one of the first things he did was to take this book out of his suitcase and give it to me. On the inside title page is a message to Smithers and me, written and signed by Margaret Court, which says, "The best is yet to come."

Some blippers will remember Margaret Court (née Smith) as a superb Australian tennis player, who won 64 major titles, including three grand slams. She was Wimbledon singles champion three times, and was world number 1 for seven years. However, not everyone knows that after she retired from tennis Margaret was ordained as a Pentecostal minister and she founded a Pentecostal church in 1995, where she is still Senior Pastor. Our friend Ray attends her church and he was correct in thinking that this book would be an appropriate gift for me, knowing that my father had been a tennis coach. 

Margaret quotes a letter of encouragement which the great Fred Perry had written to her, early in her career, when she was going through a bad patch. Some time before that my father had played against Fred Perry on the professional circuit (because in those days Wimbledon only allowed amateur players, and my father, being a young tennis coach, was disqualified) so the book will be of great interest to me.