behind the camera

When I went to the U.S. Open last week to watch some tennis, I was soon distracted by something the cameras never showed.

Behind the umpire sits a man in a chair whose job for the entire match is to hold a foot-long microphone with a handle (shaped like a revolver) in the direction of the player who is about to hit the ball. So this guy just sits there, in a chair, swinging his wrist this way and that, hoping to audibly catch the shouts and grunts of the players.

I nudged my friend and whispered "Hey, check out the guy with the microphone." She laughed and watched him for a good game or two, oblivious to the actual tennis going on beyond him.

I couldn't take my eyes off him. I paid all that money, and the legendary Martina Navratilova was stirring up the court, but I just kept watching the man with the revolver-shaped microphone moving to and fro and wondered, do you think his arm gets tired?