Gordon Forbes - Ill Take the Sunny Side

By Gordon Forbes

A Handful of Summers (1978)

Too Soon to Panic (1995)

Ill Take the Sunny Side

A Memoir

Gordon Forbes

Gordon Forbes, 2017

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission from the copyright holder.

Every effort has been made to trace the original source material contained in this book. Where the attempt has been unsuccessful, please contact the publishers to rectify any omissions.

ISBN: 978-1-928257-44-8

e-ISBN: 978-1-928257-45-5

Published by Bookstorm (Pty) Ltd

PO Box 4532

Northcliff 2115

Johannesburg

South Africa

www.bookstorm.co.za

Edited by Pam Thornley

Proofread by Wesley Thompson

Photographs courtesy listed copyright holders

Cover design by publicide

Book design and typesetting by Triple M Design

Ebook by Liquid Type Publishing Services

No winners cheque, no instant fame

We play because the games a game.

And win or lose its all the same

I see the funny side.

To start our games and keep them fair

I spin my racket in the air.

And if you serve I dont much care

Ill take the sunny side.

GF, 2017

To my family; to the Table;

and to the men and women who played tennis with me

to share some of the happiest times of my life.

Contents

G F on the cover of British Lawn Tennis magazine

Authors Note

My first book, A Handful o f Summers , emerged from a sheaf of notes that I made at the request of my sister Jean to remind her of events and adventures during the unique era when tennis changed from an amateur game to the grand spectacle it is today.

This book comes from a series of lunches Ive been having with a group of literary types men of learning and letters who not only love words, but also teach, read and write many of the finest kind. While my first book was inspired by the antics of fellow tennis players, this one is born out of the words and humour of my lunch companions. Theyre a watchful bunch who love life, have lived it and observed every part of it.

The lunches began about five years ago and soon developed a law allowing equal opportunity to listen or talk and I thus felt entitled to admire, listen, tease, be teased and relate the odd story. However, just when I was about to finish the book, both Abe and Tim let me down by unexpectedly dying. It was a terrible blow to us all, but after consulting the others and getting their blessing, I decided simply to leave everything as if they hadnt died. It seemed better that way.

Every friends death diminishes you, but for every one of us there are those few who, when they die, take part of our own lives with them. Both were such friends. Abe died first, and in all our sixty years together, it was the first time hed let me down. Tim Id known for only the five years, but he had inside him something that made me feel Id known him, too, all my life.

Fortunately for me, both Abe and Tim had good senses of humour, for Im afraid that the book is somewhat harassed by whimsy. When I gave it to publishers to read, one of the first questions they asked was, Is it fiction or non-fiction? and when I said I wasnt sure, they gave me a sideways look.

Most of it is non-fiction, I said hastily. But some of it may not be. It is more a semi-fictional book, where some of the things did happen, while others may only nearly have happened like a history of England, only shorter.

There was a long silence. You dont often find publishers reduced to silences, so I thought I should try to explain further.

The book begins with eight older people having lunch. They are real people that much I can vouch for, because Ive seen them eating and drinking, and Ive actually passed them the salt and pepper. In the book, I claim that they say and do certain things, and although they may not have, they would have if theyd thought of it.

There was still silence.

Another complication, I said, is that most of them have memory loss, so even when they did exactly what I say they did, they may not have remembered doing it. Were all getting on, and while at times we have moments of great clarity, we also go through tracts of thick mist, and for most of us, mist is more frequent

What well have to do, said the publishers at last, is have a long meeting about your book, because at long meetings we seldom reach firm decisions, and this is an ideal book not to reach a firm decision about.

Thats exactly how I felt when I wrote it, I said, relieved. In fact, the whole book was written without a single firm decision being taken.

Disclaimer

Neither author nor publisher is responsible for this book.

The Rainbow Room

And these lunches too, are a part of our lives we should never forget, I said, looking around the table. We were all there that Friday, and although it was some years ago now, I still recall the thoughtful looks. It was one of those days November, if my memory serves me, summer breeze, massive cloudscapes, jacarandas in blossom, a pair of geese nibbling at the lawn outside. And Friday afternoons still had about them that certain lull that we remembered from our working days, although by then wed all retired.

To be on the safe side Ill make a memorandum, said James, taking out his pen and notebook, the tip of his tongue appearing between his lips as he wrote, Lunches a part of life. After his full stop he looked up. Got it, he said. Now, has Richard ordered some decent wine?

I recall that particular lunch more vividly than some of the others, because it was then that the idea was born. Memories of the good old days were always rife natural, I suppose, for we were all getting on but that day they presented themselves in such vivid glimpses that for a few moments I relived every one of them; so when Richard mentioned another book, I couldnt help thinking that with a bit of luck it might just be possible

The Johannesburg Country Club has one of the loveliest rooms in the city in the country, some might say an elegant, lofty semicircle, with light pouring through tall windows that give views of gardens and glimpses of the cricket field and its pavilion through the branches of old camphor trees. It has an English feel to it Hurlingham on a summers day, if you know the place and such a strong aura of permanence and comfort that you cant help feeling everythings all right. The Rainbow Room, its called, the name alone a happy sort of accident, suggesting sunlight in a shower of rain.

On Fridays they have a Seniors Lunch, where the traditional Country Club buffet is served at a reduced price. It began as a Pensioners Lunch, but there were rumblings from the members lounge and the lunch was renamed to allow pensioners to be seniors. Nothing else changed the buffet is the same and there are still a few crutches, walking sticks and a field of grey heads waiting in line, plates in hand, murmuring the phrases that go with such occasions.