But Seriously

by John McEnroe

  Anyway, I got this incredible start. Ivan seemed to be playing it safe, so whenever I had a shot, I went for it. My mind was freed up, everything I tried was a winner. Here I was, on one leg, yet I was controlling every point. In a way, it was beautiful. Meanwhile, he freaked; 2–0, 3–0, 4–0, we were playing first to eight. At 6–3 and two breaks up, I retired. I decided that it was classier to let him “win,” even though he was getting his ass kicked, because I knew that for him it was embarrassing and he was getting pissed. Anyway, by then, he knew who was boss.

  I know what you’re thinking: “Jeez, what happened to McEnroe’s competitive edge?”

  1

  “I’d rather live in his world than live without him in mine”

  Gladys Knight and the Pips, “Midnight Train to Georgia”

  In 2002, when I ended my first book, I was just beginning the process of working out what I was going to do with my life now that I could no longer compete at the highest level as an athlete. Would it still be tennis—playing on the seniors tour, commentating, a bit of coaching—or something else, like art-dealing, or TV, or film? Or something totally different? I had no idea which way my life was heading, but I knew if I wanted to have new experiences that would fire me up the same way being on a tennis court had done, I was going to have to take some major risks.

  I’ve always needed to feel challenged, to push myself, and I’ve tried out a lot of different stuff in the intervening fifteen years. Some of it’s worked and some of it hasn’t, but in life as in sports, it’s often the big defeats that teach you the most. If you’re too scared of falling flat on your ass, you’ll never get out of your chair. And I hope that what I’ve learned from some of the more laughable calamities I’m going to describe for you on the pages that follow has given me a new perspective on the successes that came before.

  That’s why this second book is going to be much more than a chronological record of everything that’s happened to me since the last one came out. The same way a tennis match alternates between service games and having to wait on the baseline preparing yourself for what your opponent might throw at you, I’m going to intercut a straightforward account of my life as it’s unfolded with stories about the past experiences that made me the person I am today.

  Hopefully, over the past few years I’ve made some progress in grudgingly figuring out how to become a better person, and am now known for more than just hitting a tennis ball and getting upset and yelling at linesmen and umpires. But I’ll leave that for you to judge. Either way, I’ll be dropping so many names in this book it’ll make your head spin! (Only kidding… sort of.) And the first of those names is my wife’s.

  I’ve been with the singer Patty Smyth since 1994. We’ve been married for twenty of those years and are closer now than ever, which I figure is pretty amazing these days.

  Patty has done so many incredible things for me, not least loving and helping me try to bring up our six kids, three of them from my first marriage. When my first book came out, the youngest was only three, the oldest, seventeen. Now they’re all grown up—even the youngest will be off to college soon. We’ve had some ups and downs between the good times, the same as any family does, but at a point where Patty and I are going to be seeing even more of each other, the fact that I’m looking forward to that is a testament to how much we have in common. And if there’s any credit for the faint possibility that I might have become a slightly better, less selfish person over the last twenty years or so, the bulk of that should go to Patty. My life was at a low ebb when I met her, and things could’ve turned out very differently if she hadn’t been there to help me through the next few years. She’s a very strong character—even more opinionated than me, if that’s possible—and probably the only person who can tell me stuff I don’t want to hear in such a way that I’ll actually listen and take it on board. OK, maybe not without an argument, but we’ve learned over the years to listen and to compromise. Sometimes I’ll even back down and agree that she’s right. I guess it’s called getting older and wiser.

  Since it was kind of the beginning of me becoming who I am now, I wanted to start off by letting her put the record straight (as she sees it) about how we first got together. Even if the differences between her account and the one in my first book aren’t as dramatic as she thinks they are, at least this’ll give readers the chance to see what I put up with.

  Patty’s Perspective

  John and I fight constantly about when we first met—and it’s a battle that continues, because he tells the story completely differently to how I remember it. Obviously everyone has their own perspective, and people’s memories can play tricks, but he does try to rewrite history, so it’ll be good if I can get my version (which of course is 100 percent the truth) down in print.

  The funny thing for me was how different our lives were, and yet how much we had in common—not just through the showbiz world we were both involved in, but also because we’d both been brought up in Queens. I traveled the world to meet a guy who grew up fifteen minutes from me. There’s probably a reason for that, because there is something about the landscape you’re raised in—the sights, the sounds, the smells—and ours had been very similar. Maybe too similar, to the point where, if we’d met too soon, it might’ve been a problem.

  I had seen John once in a club in 1984, right before my album The Warrior came out. Tina Turner was playing and lots of people were there, so I didn’t speak to him; I think he had a girlfriend at the time. In fact, I know he did, because my friend Robert Molnar, who is in fashion and knows all the girls, was sitting with him. Anyway, John was at a table near me and he had one of those Palestinian scarves on that were kind of rock ’n’ roll back then.

  That’s the only time I remember seeing him, which was weird in itself, because we both lived in New York, we were both into music and comedy, and we knew a lot of people in common, but we had never properly met, not once. I think there was a long while where it was meant not to be. Because if we had bumped into each other too soon I would probably have been, like, “I’m not talking to him, he’s an asshole.” I needed to get my ass kicked a little for us to be ready for each other, and so did he.

  The first time I met John was in LA, at a party on Christmas Day 1993. My friends told me he was going to be there and they were super-excited about it, because so many people in LA are so into that celebrity thing. John always says it was a “blind date,” but he doesn’t know what a blind date is, which is kinda sad. First off, a blind date is where two people meet at a restaurant or someplace: a) they come alone; and b) they don’t know who they’re meeting. Whereas in our case—and I know he doesn’t remember this, because his memory is terrible, but it did happen, and I know because I was mad that she had said this to him, or to anyone—one of my friends had told him in advance: “She’s had a bad breakup and she’s still getting over it, she’s hurting right now.” This was true, but at the same time it was nobody’s business. Whatever. Let’s just say I wasn’t looking to get involved with anyone at that point. I might have registered, “Oh, OK, John McEnroe’s going to be there,” but a lot of people were going to be there.

  So, I go with my daughter to this Christmas party, and I remember very clearly John walking in. He had three kids and they were like monkeys on him, because they were little then—two and a half, six and seven. He had one on each arm, and then one’s wrapped around his leg, walking into the room.

  We met and we talked, and I liked him.

  Now I was always a chick who had a lot of guy friends. When you’re in bands and you’re in the music business, it’s all guys—there aren’t many girls. So I’d make friends with guys all the time. For example, the film director Anthony Minghella. I’d met him at my friend Carrie Fisher’s house. She was like, “He’s married!” She kept saying that to me. And I’m like, “That’s OK, I’m not interested in him romantically!” Anthony was so funny, we laughed so much, but I had no interest in him at all. I remember Carrie couldn’t wrap her
head around that.

  When I met John that day, I initially thought, “Oh, he’s a nice guy.” We talked, and then I got nervous, because I realized I actually LIKED him. He was definitely focusing his attention on me, which was making me nervous, so I went inside to make some coffee. It took so long to figure out how to make coffee in this hippy house, and I think I was purposely staying away from John for a while.

  Anyway, John got a little jealous, because I was hanging out with Bing Crosby’s son while we were trying to make the coffee. And it was when I came back over to him and we talked for a second time that he said this weird thing: “I’m not doing anything for New Year’s Eve.” That was his big line! It seemed kind of lame, and in any case I was leaving the next day for Key West—it ended up being one of the worst holidays I ever had, but that’s another story. Anyway, I didn’t want to leave John hanging too much when he’d put himself out there, so I tried to reciprocate to let him keep his dignity intact, and because I thought we might actually meet.

  So I told him, “I come to New York all the time, maybe I’ll stop by to see the gallery.” That, to me, was the cue for him to give me his card or to say, “Yeah, why don’t you take my number down?” But he didn’t, because he was a bit dull around the edges when it came to that sort of thing. He’d gotten used to women throwing themselves at him. If you’re rich, famous and happen to be hot, that’s the triple crown. It didn’t even occur to him to give me his card. And I would never ask for a guy’s number—I’d never do it. Besides, I didn’t want it that bad, because I was still licking my wounds. But I do remember feeling like something real had happened, that we had really clicked. John seemed like a sweet person. He was talking to me about his divorce and how hard it was and how he cried at night. He was very sincere, and to me—having lived in LA for four years—that was refreshing.

  The following summer, I was having lunch with the girl who had set up our meeting at the Christmas party, and I asked her: “Hey, whatever happened to John McEnroe—does he come to LA anymore? When you see him again, tell him I said ‘Hi,’ and that I really liked him, I thought he was nice.” That was it. But she got all excited and called him right away. Then it was two whole weeks before I heard back from her: “John said I could give you his number.” So I said, “You know what? I don’t want his number. Tell him if he comes to LA and he wants to call me, he can.”

  At the time I was thinking, “He’s a nice guy and maybe we’ll be friends.” Never did I think that I would wind up marrying him, or be struck with this thing that would totally take over my life. Anyway, six weeks later, he calls me—I found out afterward that he had beaten Agassi in an exhibition soon after Andre had won the US Open, so I have Agassi losing to thank for that phone call, because that’s what gave John the courage to pick up the phone.

  I think John was in Arizona on a short changeover, which gave him an excuse not to stay on the phone if he got nervous. He said, “Hi, this is John McEnroe, I’m coming into town and I thought maybe we could go out.” The funny thing was, I told him I was going to a lesbian party and if he wanted he could go with me—which is so politically incorrect now, but it was just my way of being glib. There was a long pause before he answered—a pregnant pause, a pregnant lesbian pause. The whole thing ended up being like the first half hour of a romantic comedy where all these obstacles are in the way.

  It wasn’t John that was the problem so much as the whole idea of being with anyone. John is the one that brought me back, because I was in this no-man’s land: “I’m fine—I have a good life, I’ve been lucky, I have great friends, there is no such thing as love, real love, or monogamy. This is life, and I’m OK with it.” And that’s when I met him, and that’s the reason why it was possible for us to end up being together, because I was fine with where I was at, and I think it was good for him to have to overcome some resistance.

  So we had that first date at the lesbian party, and John fell asleep in the middle of it, in the living room, because he was totally jet-lagged, and he’d probably smoked a little pot and had a beer. Buck Henry, who was there too, looked at John and said, “Too bad about your date.” We laughed so hard over that—it was hilarious, because I’d been so excited to bring a date. Here I was at a party, and I was like, “I’ve got a date! This is so cool.” At least, it was until he fell asleep.

  As I said before, John had been spoiled. Even when we were arranging to go to the party, he asked me, “Do I have to come pick you up?” He was like that. Even he admits he got a bit seduced by the whole Hollywood side of things for a while. He’d lived in this crazy bubble since he was a kid. He was famous and constantly feted by the most interesting and glamorous people in the world. All he had to do was play tennis—he didn’t have to learn about the give and take of everyday life.

  When he asked about picking me up, I said, “Why don’t you just meet me there, then?” He was like, “OK, I’ll come and meet you… but will you drive us home?” And I still went! Anyway, later that night we hung out for a bit at my house, but he left at the end of the evening. The next day he came over to take me and Ruby for lunch, and afterward he had to go and play Michael Chang.

  I remember going to Carrie Fisher’s house that afternoon. I was so nervous, I couldn’t eat. I was like, “I’m just going to do it. I’m going to go with it and be with him.” I wasn’t thinking far beyond that. I was so excited that I actually wanted to be with somebody, because it had been such a long time since I had felt that.

  And then he came back. I wasn’t planning on seeing him that night—well, we’d said we would try to get together if he got home early, but he didn’t get home till 11.30. But that was the night Vitas Gerulaitis—who was John’s very good friend—died in a terrible carbon monoxide inhalation accident. And John was calling me from the car.

  He said, “I want to come over.” I told him, “It’s late, and I’m in my pajamas already, I can see you tomorrow.” But he said, “I have this feeling about you and me, and I need to see you.” And I said, “I don’t know, I mean, what’s the hurry? We have time…” That was when he told me that Vitas had died, and I said, “OK, you can come over.” So he came, and we were together from that night on.

  It was terrifying at first, because at that time I knew how to be alone but I didn’t know how to be in a relationship, and John wanted us to be a couple right away. Within a few weeks, when I was still in LA and he was still in New York, he was asking me, “Do you want to have more kids?” And I said, “Yeah.” I always wanted to have more kids, so I closed my eyes and sort of stepped in. It was like this River of John, and I waded out into it, and the current carried me away.

  It was weird at the time, because the women who’d been there when we met that first time in Malibu were all saying, “You can’t do what he wants, you can’t go and see him, you have to play it cool.” But I told them, “I’m not playing anything, I don’t want it that bad. If it works out, great, but I’m not pretending anything. I’m just going to go, and if I want to see him, I want to see him, if I don’t want to see him, I’m not going to see him.”

  So even though I didn’t believe in true love anymore, or that you could have this sort of connection with somebody, all of a sudden I knew: “I’m going to go with this, because he’s not going to do anything bad. If it doesn’t work out, it’s not going to be because he does something horrible to me, or winds up being crazy.”

  One of the things I really liked about John was that he was very forthright and very direct. I mean, he knew what he wanted, which was unusual for LA. From the beginning he was working on me to move back to New York, that I shouldn’t be on the West Coast anymore. Now there was a part of me that wanted to go, cross the country right away and be with him, but the other part, the sensible part, was saying, “I can’t do that, John, I have a child.” I was afraid, because I had my daughter Ruby to think about, and I needed more time. We almost broke up because of that—he knew what he wanted and I was hesitating, in his mind, where in reality
I was only trying to be smart about it.

  Maybe it would have been OK if I’d moved back East immediately, but I couldn’t do it: I couldn’t give up my whole life. Because that was what I had to do. In the end, though, I did it. It took me about a year, but I gave up everything. I gave away all my stuff, I moved into his house in Malibu first, and then I was pregnant within six months. Even then, I was still trying to catch up with what had happened. He knew it was the right thing, whereas I was: “I don’t know what I’m doing, but I hope it turns out OK!”

  When we first met, obviously I knew who he was, but I wasn’t a big tennis fan. I didn’t follow the sport. He wasn’t the first famous person I’d been around, so I wasn’t expecting that side of it to be a big deal. But I had no idea how profoundly known John is everywhere. I mean, in African villages, they know him. Deep in Indonesia, they know him. It’s weird. I’d say to him, “How do they know who you are? They don’t have TVs here.”

  The other big adjustment was that a lot of people around me were freaked out by me being with John. Everyone started acting different, even my own family. I don’t know if it was because they thought they were losing me to another world, but whatever it was, it was bizarre the way people changed. So we had this very intense connection that was just me and him, and nothing but mayhem and chaos around us. In a way, I think that worked out well, because it helped me understand what he was used to.

  I hadn’t been involved with anybody with that level of fame before. I’d hung out with a lot of famous people—Carrie Fisher was Princess Leia, for Christ’s sake—and I’d noticed how people would be weird around them, sometimes, but this was a whole other level.