Tribute to the ball boy who peed his pants

It did really happen. At the Australian Open a ball boy had an incontinence moment of significant consequences. While some only leak, he actually gushed. So much so, play was suspended for forty minutes while sawdust and blowers were used to dry out the grass to make play safe.

I suggest we should have nothing but gratitude and admiration for the poor, hopefully, anonymous individual. Indeed, if I had the power he would be elevated to hero level; even have a national holiday named after him.

Think about it. First, he has brought a new perspective to the concept of ‘there is always someone worse off than me’.  Given the choice between this and scratching your eyes with a fork, you would be reaching for the cutlery draw.

For a teenager, peeing your pants and having your classmates know is as bad a humiliation as you can imagine. But that was only the half of it. It is not only classmates and friends  but family, neighbours, Australia, the world. Could the shame – the abject humiliation – be any worse? The only consolation is he has yet to make it to You Tube. But that may only be a matter of time. And ‘Charlie bit my finger’ would have nothing on this one.

To mess up semi-privately is one thing. To do so spectacularly and publicly is another. It is hard to imagine any of us will every get anywhere near such a state of public shame  – unless we are bankers. But they don’t seem to care anyway.

So the next time all eyes are on me for behaving like an incompetent moron I’ll give thanks for the incontinent ball boy’s demonstration that my humiliation is only a pale shadow of his.

But more than that, his soggy contribution to history is also a challenge. After all, something spectacular had to have happened in terms of commitment to a cause for such an event to take place.

You can be sure he was not someone with a history of bladder malfunction. He’d never have taken the job. Nor was uncontrollable laughter likely to have induced the urinical gush. It was a tennis match for goodness sake.

So here he was, desperate for the bathroom but with a job to do to which he was committed. What was to come first? Comfort or commitment? Personal interest or seeing the job through?

He chose the best when many would have done the opposite. The deal is that commitment can sometimes be at our personal cost. It is part of the package and we need to wise up to reality.

So there’s a lesson here for us all and a hero to be feted. But, for his sake, I just hope his name wasn’t Peeeeeeter.

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