Speaker 1 0:00

Hi, I'm Shelly Maurer and I'm Cher Emrick. Welcome to Life.

Speaker 2 0:04

Lessons from Pickleball where we engage with pickleball players from around the world about life on and off the court.

Meet Joel Bell, Son of Pickleball's Creator

Speaker 1 0:12

Thanks for joining us. Welcome everyone to Life Lessons from Pickleball. We are so excited to have with us today Joel Bell. Joel, your connection to the sport is incredible. Your father was one of the three men who created this game that has become a global phenomenon.

Speaker 2 0:33

And beyond that you have such a fascinating journey. You married your childhood next door neighbor, Julia Kuskin how cool is that. Spent years in Los Angeles making music and producing records, and for the past 20 years you've been a therapist and counselor in Ballard Washington. That's quite a path.

Speaker 1 0:53

Incredible. And now you've added author to your list of accomplishments. By the way, you are a really good writer With your book Five Star Trust, a memoir, and in it you uncover a side of your father's life that most of us, and sounds like even you, didn't know for a long time, and we'll definitely get into that. But first, as pickleball players, we owe your dad such a great debt of gratitude. So how was the game invented and how did you? How did it ever get the name pickleball?

Speaker 3 1:26

I kind of think the the origin story is pretty well known, but uh, the story goes that, uh, my cousin, my father's best friend's son, frank, was about 14. He didn't want to be on Bainbridge that summer and he'd rather be in Seattle with his pals. It was boring out there at the grandparent picture on Pleasant Beach and he, you know, sulked and of course dad and Joel were off playing golf, leaving this brood of kids. It was a different era, right, there was no responsibility that the dads get involved, and but Frank complained I'm bored, I don't want to be here. And Joel said well, when I was a kid we used to make up games. So Frank challenged, he said so, make up a game. So the origin of the game is that it was a childhood taunt taken up by Joel Pritchard and my dad. They found ragged paddles, they found a tired wiffle ball, there was a disused badminton court and that was the recipe.

Speaker 1 2:31

And how soon did it kind of take shape?

Speaker 3 2:33

Well, the kids were forced off the court almost immediately because it's the only racket sport you can play with a cocktail, that's for sure.

Speaker 3 2:42

And I think that I would say I don't know that my folks, that Joel and Barney and dad, were particularly different than other people in that they liked to invent, like it was fun to invent, right, the ball bounces. True, it's condensed. Tennis was kind of a game that people played Cocktails, you know, on the side of the net and you could argue and just talk, smack the whole time. There was a lot of elements that just were baked in at the beginning and the rules became official.

Speaker 3 3:19

Also part of the apocryphal story when Dad and Joel were losing very badly to a pair of very athletic young men who were just jamming the ball down their throat and so typical to my dad just ad hoc inventing the kitchen so you wouldn't lose the game, right, things like that. And I'm trying to think what else was unique, and I believe it's probably Joel who was the real camp counselor, kind of personality, like if you can't serve a winner, really, then the automatic other thing is that you have to give the advantage to the receiver and then, not being able to rush the net, it just made it instantly competitive, right, unlike any other. Well, uniquely to the game, but it was basically of a desire not to lose to some younger dudes was the motivation.

Speaker 1 4:15

So are you saying you kids actually ended up not playing very much yeah?

Speaker 3 4:20

I am saying that Well, but it would be, you know, like. I'm just trying to think if there's a kind of a similar analogy to something that's bought for the, something brought home for the kids but the kids never get a chance to, I can't think of it offhand.

Speaker 1 4:36

Like a train set.

Speaker 3 4:37

Like begging for a dog. I promise I'll walk it, you know. And then you never you know, somebody else has to walk the dog, that kind of.

Speaker 1 4:45

I'm not saying it very well, but so there are a couple different stories on how the game got the name. Yeah, what's your story? It it's not. This is the story I mean. What's the truth, joel?

Speaker 3 4:59

This is the truth. What's the truth? Everybody knows it's there was a dog Pick, dog pickles who belonged to the pritchards. But the truth is is that joan joanne aunt joanne, uh, noticed that because there's a hodgepodge of rules from other games. It reminded her when she wrote in college that the the there was an a boat and a b boat of the best and second best rowers to fill out a skull, and then whoever was left over was put in the pickle boat, and so these were all. Because this was a hodgepodge of rules, she named the game Pickleball.

Speaker 1 5:35

That's so funny yeah. That is so funny.

Speaker 2 5:38

So did you ever take up Pickleball, Joel?

Speaker 3 5:41

Oh yeah, yeah, we played, I mean my whole life. But this idea that we just picked it up and couldn't put it down, the kids, you know that was not the case. It was just everybody was playing all the time, neighbors and friends, up and down Pleasant Beach. And then gradually I think Joel Barney would admit that the smartest thing in terms of if you're evangelical about selling the game and getting it out into the world was like a convention for high school sports and curriculum and introducing it one season in one of those environments and it was scooped up, certainly in the Northwest, but I think broadly, with the PE departments all over the country. That's what I think was the mission solved. That's when it planted a seed.

Speaker 1 6:32

That's how it got spread.

Speaker 3 6:33

And what's interesting.

Speaker 1 6:35

We've talked with a lot of people who said, yeah, they had pickleball in school but then they didn't pick it up again until years later in their adulthood. And I'm fascinated that the game in fact kind of became an adult's game. It was meant to be for the kids to keep them happy, but it became an adult's game and it's like the adults of the world have made it this incredible game, and now the young'uns are coming in and saying, okay, hey, this is a cool game, I can play this too.

Speaker 3 7:03

I think maybe with this wave of youngins it's coincidental to the attempt to make a professional league as well. Right, so there's kind of a goal other than you can't just play it because you enjoy it, can you? Right, it's like I've been known to get kind of dour about where the game is at and I've had to give that up. It really is a very different game. It's now a sport.

Speaker 3 7:32

Let's put it that way. It's a very different game than the lark that was contrived on Bainbridge many years ago. It's a thing and we're talking because of it, but it's not the esprit of. I mean, do you know anybody who drinks while they play a match? It's highly competitive and people are like desperately serious about it, you know.

Speaker 1 7:56

Well, I think the serious athletes are.

The Real Origin Story of Pickleball

Speaker 3 7:59

But yeah, there are actually a lot of communities that bring food and and beer and wine and and you'll be happy I don't want to promote alcoholism, as you know, contingent or integral to the game there, but there are now clubs sprouting up which will just create another well, I don't know what the word is sort of community, uh, rather than just a pickup, uh, public court kind of, or backyard or driveway. Now you're going to buy into a cold club kind of atmosphere and yeah, and it's just. You know, it's just become something different.

Speaker 3 8:37

Yeah, I'm sure, being a part of the original, it's hard to see how it's kind of changed over the years, I think that's why I'm outing myself Like it's very easy for me to it was previously in talking about the game like, well, you know something very disdainful, and like you're on, this is all too serious. And like and I had to get it's, I had the problem, it was my problem, you know. Like I was there. It's like yeah, it was one.

Speaker 1 9:05

And it is how many years old now. It does change over the years.

Speaker 3 9:09

It's 65 to 20, 25. That's wild. It's hard to imagine.

Speaker 1 9:16

Well, you'll be happy to know that my community still takes it very lightly. It's like recess. We do try to win, but it's not serious.

Speaker 3 9:27

There's a tournament at my sister's place in Massachusetts she's over sort of near Cape Cod and they now have the Bill Bell annual pickleball tournament with trophy and plaques keeping track, and they're all people who played a lot of tennis who took to the game. I still remember they still do play. It's pretty lighthearted, but you know people are competitive. Yep, I love playing in tournaments and getting my medals.

Speaker 2 9:59

Oh, yeah, yeah, you know, I get it.

Speaker 3 10:04

Oh, we're just here to have fun, are you really?

Speaker 1 10:08

Well, speaking of Bill Bell, your dad, when we met you at an event a few weeks ago and you mentioned that your dad had this other side of his life that was unknown, we were absolutely captivated. And so then we got to read your book, and your story is wild. It's just amazing. So most people don't know it right. So tell us, when did you first realize there was another side to your dad's life, and what was it?

Speaker 3 10:40

my dad went to work for the cia, cia, in a role that a lot of men of his generation and temperament did, having tested during getting in and out of the army, enlisting to fight, and the psychometric testing was probably pretty rigorous for people who are willing to do that. And he had a certain profile. I was born, so he was about 40 and had been working in Washington state politics, but I went to work for a Canadian nickel mining company. Officially and unofficially he was an operative for the CIA and took the family and took us abroad. So we picked up and moved from Seattle to New York for a couple of years abroad. So we picked up and moved from Seattle to New York for a couple of years and then moved abroad to Australia and Southeast Asia and we did not come back. I didn't return to the States until eighth grade. So I was gone from five to 14. So 10 years we were abroad and all the while mostly he was VP of a nickel mining company.

Speaker 3 11:52

The US had just helped install a leader in Indonesia. General Suharto put down a popular communist movement to do so. The US was doing a lot of movement to do so. The US was doing a lot of that around the time. This is how the Cold War gets fought, that kind of thing. So yeah, and so Dad, in order to do that kind of work, had developed a kind of character about himself.

Speaker 3 12:21

He had a, I think in the book I talk about the game, sort of the shtick he would play. We would stop, for instance, if you think of an old British colonial style hotel like that had been there, you know, already for more than 100 years, the raffles in Singapore, and of course they have tennis courts. But dad, would you know, kind of throw a minor fit. No, how would he say it? He would grandstand I'd like to book the pickleball court for later in the day. You know that kind of thing, knowing full well, they had no idea what he was talking about. What do you mean? You know he was that kind of, you know, ugly American.

Speaker 1 12:54

So you're saying, you're saying that at raffles there were tennis courts and he would say at the front desk okay, I want to book a pickleball court and they're saying what the heck is pickleball.

Speaker 3 13:03

And he's upset. How do you not know? No, they would say excuse me, sir, I've never heard of it. You know they were polite, he was rude.

Speaker 1 13:11

And that's how he got pickleball overseas.

Speaker 3 13:13

Then he would say like well, here let me show you Right. And then ask Barney or Clutch to send a box to the raffles. And he was the international ambassador. But that's kind of one way that he would do it. Our house in Jakarta had a pickleball court so he would invite people over. They're tennis whites, you know. That's how you did it, right. Oh, my goodness.

Speaker 3 13:35

Tennis whites and the Canadian ambassador and some fixer from Czechoslovakia and the Indonesian Olympic badminton team, who were actually the best players in the world. Yeah, they understood the game immediately. Cocktails and a lot of. So that's how people socialized.

Speaker 2 13:54

But at this time you had no idea that your dad was part of the CIA. You just saw him at the mining company, but at this time you had no idea that your dad was part of the CIA.

Speaker 3 14:00

No, but because I was the youngest, because I was around a lot. My brother and sister were away in school in Australia, in boarding school, and I remembered things and then gradually began asking questions and sort of enduring vague answers. And then by the time he passed away in 2006, I had all his files, his personal files, and so partly in my doctoral process as an academic that part of it I really liked research, I really liked writing and inventing, you know kind of trying to chip away at something, kind of compelling. And then my dad's stuff is there and I thought I think I'll keep chipping away, and and then I built my memoir out of my memories and putting the pieces together retroactively. That's what it meant. Oh look, that's corroborated. And then just tried to make it a readable story.

Speaker 1 15:06

Did you ever ask him were you a CIA spy? And he said yes. Or was it ever that straightforward?

How Pickleball Spread Around the World

Speaker 3 15:14

Well, cher, I'm a trained American observer and as a trained American observer, cher, that's how Dad work for the Department of Defense, and the story kind of depicts how he got himself out of the cold, as they say. So he just had this kind of I call it a double, and trying to keep that secret life secret actually did damage. In spite of the best intention to have a separate life, a secret life, in spite of the best intention to not, you know, to have a separate life, a secret life, he wasn't able to pull it off in a way that, like that, it was as tidy a barrier as he thought, it leaked all over and had an effect on how our family felt.

Speaker 1 16:10

Yeah, I wanted to mention that because you know we think of wow, somebody was a CIA spy. That's so exciting. You have a parent who's that. But there was a lot of loneliness in life too for you because he was gone so much and then he can't be authentic about where he's been, what he's been doing. So there's this divide, almost a cloak, between you and your dad, right?

Speaker 3 16:37

You stated really well, it's not particularly painful in the sense that that's just where you're a kid. This is just how it?

Speaker 3 16:45

is. But you hit the nail on the head that the actual life of leading a double life on the one level makes regular things exciting because you've got a secret that nobody else knows, right? So if your tendency is toward boredom and indolence, I'm going to juice up regular life by having a secret. On the other hand, you spend a lot of time in that. There was a period in there where he was in the air more than he was on the ground.

Speaker 1 17:13

Wow.

Speaker 3 17:14

Everybody flew at the time and this is the age of the telex machine. But there was one bit in the book just adding up the hours. He was in the air in all the way to the ground with immigration stamps. You know that they put on a passport, but he was always in the air, he was always flying. But that's a lot of time by yourself is the point. Yeah.

Speaker 1 17:50

For whom?

Speaker 3 17:51

Who's by themselves, he is, he's in, he's, he's, you know, and so you're right about the loneliness he's in, he's, he's, you know. And so you're right about the loneliness it's, it's, it suited his person. It suited him, I think, to be on his own, like that, and I didn't know. This is weird, you don't. You don't know. It's weird. Or what? Home, if home, feels bad, you don't know. And plus we're having this amazing adventure as a family. You don't know, and plus we're having this amazing adventure as a family. I'm seeing the world Hong Kong and Singapore and Africa and Indonesia and traveling as a normal thing, you know. Yeah, you put it all together kind of later, a little bit.

Speaker 1 18:40

And as you were putting it together, you wrote about how music became kind of your lifeline, because expressing emotions wasn't common, probably not common even in that age right, certainly with our fathers and all. But you found a way to express yourself through music.

Speaker 3 18:49

Yeah, I think a lot of people who end up being musicians or artists or whatever it is. Some component of that is that you of my era is a lot of time to sit and watch dust motes in the sunlight. You know you're alone a lot and so you're looking for companionship, you're lonely, whatever. And then, of course, the Beatles hit in a big way 66, 67 and changed the world. Yep, and then I'm being sent abroad at the same time. American culture is spreading abroad, as it were, right, and it just landed on me and I'm also kind of the feely one anyway in the family. So it's kind of those three things and I think were the reason for a lot of people, like when they were gripped by I don't know a certain song, shelly, if you heard something when you were 10 or whatever, and it's like you know but but for me it was like I'm having that because that's the coolest thing I've ever heard in my life and it means everything. You know that kind of sensation.

Speaker 3 19:52

And dad, dad, you know he was responsible for a lot of the records that made their way home. I think there was a part of him that wanted to be able to commune in that way. I don't think he intended to influence me as he did. In that sense that's for him. They were his records. Yeah, in this book I say you know he brought home the Beatles' Abbey Road because a person whose opinion he respected, our next door neighbor, said it was a work of genius, right. And so, wow, I need to check that out. You know that kind of book of the month club sort of filter on it. I hear this is a very good book. I say okay.

Speaker 1 20:31

And your parents ultimately separated and divorced. How old were you when that happened? 14. Was she aware that your dad was in the CIA?

Speaker 3 20:40

She didn't believe it. That's actually the first most interesting thing in writing a memoir was to understand their relationship. The first most interesting thing was, well, my mom's name was Tina. Whatever it was, your husband alludes to being up to. Most of the time you think he's kind of lying. He's just making it up and you're okay with that. I thought that was so funny.

Speaker 3 21:05

Right, Like I wouldn't lie and here's the most important thing, and dad was okay letting her think that. And then your double life is the fabric of a double life is set. Yeah, that means that your partner regards you as something of a blowhard mendicant, you know, and like a kind of like can't make sense of the guy. But she had kids and a new country to figure out and she was, you know, I think, kind of herself, not super feely, so she kept it to herself that would have been too much too.

Speaker 2 21:42

She just didn't want to believe it, right? I mean, she was in a new place with all her kids, and I think you're right.

Speaker 3 21:48

I think that that there's a bit of like just survival, yes, you know. So I just think that's a that to me, when I was tinkering away, trying to make a story, trying to understand my folks, I knew that she didn't believe it and he was okay letting her not believe it. That, to me, was the part that really kind of allowed me to start to put memories in the right place. They were alienated much of the time from each other.

Speaker 3 22:15

Yeah, I have a different era about marriages. Obviously, like there's a, you know, I don't need my spouse to be my best friend that kind of attitude.

Speaker 1 22:25

And asking too many questions is not okay.

Speaker 3 22:28

Well, I think what you do is, if your answers don't make any, if your answers are so general and opaque, you just you stop trying. Here I'll give you an example. This is so stupid. Yeah, here I'll give you an example. This is so stupid. Yeah, Cher, ask me what I did at work yesterday.

Speaker 1 22:42

So, joel, you were at work yesterday. How'd it go?

Speaker 3 22:45

Well, I was talking to some people about some projects that were kind of of interest.

The CIA Connection Revealed

Speaker 1 22:51

Thank you for all that detail.

Speaker 3 22:54

You just stop asking Now in my case, in my case, I have confidentiality as a shrink, I think.

Speaker 1 23:01

Julia doesn't ask, doesn't expect much information from me and I don't give it, but you know, and that's somebody who helps us delve into the details, the feelings, all those things that you kind of had to stay away from so much of your life.

Speaker 3 23:31

Or at least you couldn't express what was going on with you as openly and honestly as you would hope your patients could do. That drove me from the beginning, when I was setting out on the doctor path which was, on the surface of it, psychotherapy and espionage look identical.

Speaker 1 23:42

Say more about that, say something.

Speaker 3 23:44

Well, I'm learning your secrets. You're my client. Let's say and I'm sitting here, you know, here I'm doing the therapist thing you know like tell me more. Right. And what do you know about me?

Speaker 2 23:57

nothing and I'm learning all your right, oh, so what?

Speaker 3 24:03

so the question then would be not oh, look at the similarity. What distinguishes me from a spy? That's the, that's the. We get a little closer to the. I want a fancy word is archetype, but but structure of what's the distinction? So the question is how you listen? Is everything?

Speaker 1 24:21

how you're listening right. And why?

Speaker 3 24:25

And what you're listening for.

Speaker 1 24:26

Yes.

Speaker 3 24:27

And, and so I guess what I discovered, to my own relief like oh God, I'm a spy, I'm a terrible, I'm a terrible therapist. When I'm listening like a spy, I'm not engaged at the same level of vulnerability as my client. So my job is to. What distinguishes it is that a spy thinks that they can know something without being known in return. Yeah Right, I was never. Never here, I got the information. The truth is all. The best espionage, just like the best therapy, is, there's tremendous intimate understanding between both parties. Each knows that they're in a role and what happens is real. Right, yeah, but the distinction is that I don't want anything from my client that's it right.

Speaker 3 25:25

That's the difference I don't want anything so yeah, at some point you go well, therapy's fake, I'm just paying you to be my friend. And that if the therapy is successful, every client at some point begins to feel that weirded out, that way, like, oh, I'm just, you know, blah, blah, blah. And the best analogy that I've come up with is to ask have you ever cried at a movie? And people say, well, sure, it's like. Well, movies are fake, but the tears are real.

Speaker 3 25:53

So, yes, this is a contrived process to try to find healing or growth or whatever. This is a we set out on an adventure. You don't know what you're going to get. Like the top of a movie. There's no trailer, right and then. But you're intentionally setting it up and then you have an experience inside. Even though you've intentionally set it up, the thing that happens in a session is actually authentic and so just because it's contrived, it doesn't mean that it's not real.

Speaker 1 26:20

And authentic and maybe this is what you were saying is that you have no intention to use any information you receive or insights you receive for any other purpose than for that person's advancement.

Speaker 3 26:32

Yeah, the way I think I put it sometimes overly self-deprecating, but not so far off the mark is to say if it's going well, I'm useless. Yeah, there's no other than other than some kind of enhanced experience of contact and managing contact with another person and then being able to notice how we're handling that there's not. What do you do with that except walk out like a more rich person in some way, with more facility?

Speaker 1 27:02

let's say so I tell you yeah, use me Absolutely, use me Right, right, use me Absolutely, use me right, right, joel what a fascinating journey you have been on, and thank you for everything you're doing to make this world a better place, and with your music and your therapy and all of those. You also play pickleball, and so the question is what life lessons have you learned, either on the court that you use in your life, or life lessons that you use in your life that you also find yourself using on the court?

Speaker 3 27:36

I guess the first lesson and most of maybe your audience for this podcast are older, which is never underestimate an octogenarian. I'm in Ballard and there's the community center down here. They play every Tuesday and they play every afternoon, I think, and I thought you know, I'd kind of like to play again. This is years ago. I'll just go down there. There's a little window into the gymnasium, part of it, and I'm nervous.

Speaker 3 28:07

First of all, joel, shut up about your dad. Don't just, you're just here to knock them. Don't say anything, don't be an idiot, don't say it. Don't say it, don't say it, don't say it. Right, but if it were a movie, if it were a film, it's a jump cut to. Well, my dad, you know, like it's just terrible. Anyway, I'm looking in the. It's just terrible. Anyway, I'm looking in the window and they're just, like you know, they're all 70 years old, or it's the middle of the day. Like I happen to not work on a Monday and, like you know, I act like I'm retired, which I'm not. I said, okay, well, all right, now go easy on them. That's what I tell them. Just go easy. You're just here to try the game out again. They handed me my ass. You're just here to try the game out again. They handed me my ass. They just like ate, just ate.

Speaker 3 28:53

Handed me, my lunch, like I was completely. So my arrogance, like playing the game well, has nothing to do with being more athletic, necessarily. It's just the first rule of the game. Like it's helpful to be athletic, it's not necessary. Right, right, right.

Speaker 2 29:10

Exactly.

Speaker 3 29:12

And the problem is the real problem, they handed me my after I had confessed. You know who I was, who my dad was.

Speaker 2 29:20

You did it. You did it. You didn't help yourself.

Speaker 3 29:22

I completely blew it. I completely blew it. I was like whoa, whoa, whoa. It's like oh, and then trounced me.

Speaker 1 29:28

That's so funny. I was thinking, yeah, you could save face by afterwards saying and by the way, my dad invented, no, it was too late.

Speaker 3 29:35

It was too late. That's so good. So don't underestimate the elderly.

Speaker 1 29:41

In life and on the court that's right.

Speaker 3 29:43

Yeah, I think that might tie back to the beginning of our conference, my old position, feeling kind of dour about people's obsession with the game. There are serious problems we need to address in our culture and all the wise and sagacious folk that have some perspective, their priority is pickleball. No, we need you. We need you to like you know. Let's storm the gates.

Speaker 1 30:16

for god's sake, this is bad and you'd rather what I think we need to do is take pickleball to dc and get all of the Republicans and Democratic representatives playing together and finding that joy and connection and community that Shelley and I and so many around the world are finding.

Speaker 3 30:37

It's this community building. You're quoting Joel Pritchard verbatim. Oh, yeah, yeah, he took it to introduce the game initially and would invite legislators down. He introduced the game initially and would invite legislators down and that's sort of the camp counselor character the affable character that he was that just get people playing together. I don't know where he got it, but the quote that I've always remembered and relate to him is there's no underestimating what you can do if you don't care who gets the credit.

Speaker 3 31:11

Oh, that's good and so get people playing together and get them talking, get them playing and that kind of. So you're not wrong. I think that was actually how he got a lot done as a politician.

Speaker 1 31:23

That is very cool and I am seeing the world changing. That is very cool and I am seeing the world changing. We had a guest from Ghana who talked about how different tribes would get together on the court and people who wouldn't ever cross paths, and certainly I'm experiencing that too. It's just amazing. So it's a fascinating journey of your dad and Joel and Barney all coming together and creating this game for the kids that the kids ended up not getting to play, but it is now become such a community building, uplifting, absolute, joy filled experience, and so I thank you that on behalf of your dad and the others, and thank you for sharing this story. I just find it fascinating that your dad has this whole other life, and so how can we find you online for the various things that you're involved in?

Speaker 3 32:15

Well, I work half the week as a shrink, so I'm at drjoelbellcom, and the other half I've always tried to be creative, so I'm continually either sharing music with pals or making music, and the book will be on Amazon. Right now it's at that lulucom website. Um, I really only had two, two things as a kid that I was interested in, and I'm lucky that I've been able to make a living doing one of them so brilliant but they can find your music on Spotify.

Speaker 1 32:46

Brilliant.

Speaker 2 32:48

Well.

Speaker 1 32:48

Joel, this has been awesome, shelly.

Speaker 3 32:51

thank you for having me and I'll send when you decide to launch this. I'll send the link to my brother and sister and see, I'm not a slouch.

Speaker 1 33:03

We will verify that, okay, yeah, thank you, Joel.

Speaker 3 33:04

Thank you so much.

Speaker 1 33:05

Bye-bye and thank you all. Oh yeah, Thank you, Joel.

Speaker 2 33:06

Thank you so much.

Speaker 1 33:08

Bye-bye and thank you all. Oh my gosh. Thank you for tuning in today. What a fabulous conversation and we look forward to a new conversation next week. Bye-bye everyone.

Speaker 2 33:19

Bye-bye. If you love our podcast, we'd be so grateful if you'd take a few seconds to follow or subscribe to Life Lessons from Pickleball. This ensures you'll never miss an episode and helps us continue these wonderful conversations.

Speaker 1 33:34

On Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen, go to the show page and tap the follow button in the top right corner, and on YouTube, click the subscribe button under any of the episodes. Thanks so much. Hope to see you on the court.