MELBOURNE—For me, the final image of the 2011 Grand Slam tennis season came late on the last night of the U.S. Open. I was looking back at a locked-down but still lit-up Arthur Ashe Stadium from the empty train station outside of Flushing Meadows. The only sounds came from the crickets in the grass, and the only people in sight were the clean-up crews trudging out of the grounds. But the flags at the top of the arena were still blowing in and the Jumbotron still registered the scores of the men's final in searing bright lights. The tennis carnival, after two frenzied weeks, had moved on. It was as if the Open had never happened.
I thought about that scene as I got my first view of the 2012 Slam season. I was looking down at another empty train station, on the commuter railway that takes you into and out of central Melbourne. I had started on the sloping garden path that leads past the city's famous Cricket Ground, and back up toward the tennis center. It was nearly silent on Friday evening; this time the only sounds came from the birds in the park. Put those sounds together with the distinctive piney smell you get along this tree-lined path and it felt like spring to an American coming out of the winter cold.
The cricket ground was dark; there was a big match, of course, but it was in Perth. Past that modernized but historic arena—it’s one of my favorites anywhere, even though I’ve never been inside—and past the statues of soaring cricket legends that surround it, I headed back up and onto a walking bridge that gave me a spectacular view of downtown.
As you take your first steps up this bridge, you feel like you’ve moved from British Empire to American Empire. The neighborhood surrounding the tennis and cricket arenas is made up of stately English-style homes and gardens, and is traversed by trolley cars. But all of that is quickly dwarfed by the downtown’s towering U.S.-style skyscrapers. It’s a scene made for vivid and volatile sunsets, and there was a wild one going on above the city last night.
The bridge is angular and contemporary in design, and speakers set into its sides pipe in a multicultural blend of voices, chants, songs, and ululations. From one of those sides, you can see the section of Melbourne Park’s side courts that jut out toward downtown. Here was the Aussie Open’s familiar sea of orange and aqua-blue laid out in front of us (I was joined by a single small group of photo-snapping tourist fans). It was close to nine in the evening, but the qualifying rounds for the women’s draw were still going on under the lights. All over the place, WTA hopefuls and Lesser Wozniackis hit and ran and fist-pumped with a military-like precision and aggressiveness. If nothing else, tennis teaches obedience, above all, to the incoming ball.
The sounds we heard from the courts were also familiar. “Come on!” after a winner; a despairing moan after an easy miss; a rally punctuated by screeches of effort. This was the dance before the dance, the prelude to the big show that starts Monday, and even from far away you could sense the usual edge of extra desperation that goes with it. The Grand Slam season was beginning again, and these young women wanted to be part of it, if only for one match.
The songs and ululations continued to rise in a steady stream from the bridge's speakers. At that moment, the music of modern tennis fit right in. The sounds of effort on the court were added to the multicultural symphony—chant was followed by shriek was followed by cracked backhand. The carnival was back in town.