Aretha Franklin and Allie Ritzenberg

Times are busy at the moment. I’ve enjoyed two huge highlights these past weeks. Firstly, we saw the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin live in concert. I cannot say enough how thrilled I was to see her and hear her sing live. At 75, this lady is every bit of class and special’ness that Motown could produce. I wore my Motown Detroit t-shirt that night. She wore a lovely long white gown with heels and moved quite slowly around the stage. But her voice is as fabulous as it ever was and she is an entertainer. She’s got wit, charm and grace. Her orchestra was magic. She sang for about 90 minutes with a break in the middle and chose a great set of her hits, with Respect as the encore of course. Detroit recently named a street after her, she has 19 Grammys, was the first woman inducted to the US Rock n Roll Hall of Fame and has been performing for 54 years. She IS the Queen of Soul and this is her final tour. Completely lucky to see her and this is one of the great highlights of this US adventure.

 

I also went to the Citi Open tennis for the day. I went last year and missed being with my mate Aussie Bob. I was thinking of him. However this year, a friend invited me along to sit in the suites for the day/night. She is friends with a legend called Allie (Albert) Ritzenberg and he had some tickets so we all went together. It was a great day in comfort and the tennis was good, really good. There were great matches and I got to cheer on Aussie Jordan Thompson who lost in a tie break in the 3^rd set. I was the lone Aussie wolf in the stadium and gave my fellow suite fans something to smile about. Back to Allie, he is 98 and a really kind, generous and interesting man. You can google him on wiki but here is a snapshot as I did my research before meeting him. I have to say it was surreal to hear him talk about all the tennis legends he’s met, played, coached or knows. He talked about Rod Laver, Ken Rosewell and other Australian greats like they were old mates. It really was a great day and experience. I will be sending a lovely bottle or two of Australian wine to thank him – this really was a lucky opportunity for me. The link below is to an interview they did recently. It's well worth watching, very impressive man especially at 98.

Click here...Tennis Channel Interview - Allie Ritzenberg 2017

Here is an extract off wiki about Allie. He and his older brothers were self-taught public parks tennis players growing up in Washington DC. He became the top ranked junior player in the Mid-Atlantic States and one of the premiere U.S. college players as the number one player at the University of Maryland.

Beginning in 1968, with the advent of the “Open” era of tennis, when professional players were allowed to compete again, Ritzenberg entered the competitive tennis arena as a 50-year-old man. Over the course of the next 45 years, he won senior national championships in over a dozen countries. He was also the Senior Asia champion, Senior European champion, ranked as high as number 1 in the Senior International Tennis Federation and a USPTA Senior Champion. Championships. Ritzenberg retired in 2005, as the number 1 world tennis player among men ages 85 and up.

Ritzenberg is considered to be a major contributor to the popularization and democratization of tennis in the United States. Starting in the early 1950s Ritzenberg actively sought to integrate tennis by insisting that Washington area tournaments invite top ranked black athletes, by actively recruiting black members to the clubs with which he was associated, and by assisting black athletes with academic admission to an exclusive boys school in Washington, D.C. He organized tennis exhibitions, invited many of the world’s top players to Washington and played in exhibitions with Althea Gibson, Richard “Pancho” Gonzalez, Billie Jean King, Neale Fraser, Roy Emerson and conducted clinics at mental hospitals and children’s homes, and was instrumental in providing tennis opportunities for the disabled, including wheelchair bound athletes.

During the Kennedy Administration, Ritzenberg taught tennis at St. Albans to a number of politicians. Ritzenberg was called to the White House to give tennis instruction to First Lady Jackie Kennedy and to hit with President JFK. At the International Tennis Hall of Fame and Museum, Ritzenberg is best known for his extensive tennis collection amassed over 50 years and acknowledged to be the largest, most comprehensive such private collection in the world. "Ranging from the Renaissance through the 1930s, the Albert and Madeleine Ritzenberg Collection covers virtually the entire history of tennis.

We also went to the Smithsonian IMAX again and saw Dunkirk, the movie about the evaculation of the British and French from Dunkirk during WWII. 400,000 men cornered on a beach awaiting rescue by the Navy to get them across the English Channel back to England. I’ve heard some bad reviews of being long, boring etc but I thought it as a good movie. It was a bit slow in parts but overall, the movie portrayed the stress and anxiety of the week long evacuation. It was gut-wrenching, heartbreaking  and stressful watching these soldiers just have freedom taken away from them every minute. It’s an important historic battle and well worth seeing.

We have good friends from Houston visiting for the next week and a few more social engagements. We are getting new neighbours also which will bring new friendships hopefully. The owners have been posted to Mozambique. 

A few random pics below to finish. We've been getting high humidity and lots of rain. The running pic is me after a 12 mile (19k) run when humidity was pretty high. I was drenched. We are off to Mexico in 2 weeks so it will likely be a mojito and swimming blog next time. My sister will be here in a month so I'm excited for the next few months.