God is a jolly jester. And last night he stirred the pot of the player who so thrives on order and control — Roger Federer — by having him become the dad of twin girls. Can you spell “chaos?”
Bob Bryan — the elder Bryan twin — joked, “
Aha, funny about Federer and the twins. Now he’s screwed.”
But Papa Roger didn’t care. He was thrilled.
“I have some exciting news to share with you,” read his Facebook message. “Late last night, in Switzerland, Mirka and I became proud parents of twin girls. We named them Myla Rose and Charlene Riva and they are both healthy and along with their mother, they are doing great. This is the best day of our lives.”
With that news in hand, we quickly spoke to the leading authority on parenting tennis twins — Wayne and Kathy Bryan — the parents of doubles whizzes Bob and Mike Bryan.
“Roger’s life is ruined forever,” they joked. “It’s going to be hard, but they’ve got a doubles team. They won’t be winning Wimbledon singles; it’ll be Wimbledon doubles. No pressure.”
And, yes, bookies are already busy. Lambroke Pic has crazy, optimistic 25/1 odds that one of them will win a major by 2035. Oddsmaker William Hill says it is 250/1 that one of them will win Wimbledon, or 333/1 that they will win Wimbledon doubles by their 25th birthdays.
Wayne and Kathy Bryan remembered their original shock — just a week before the birth of their twins — when their doctor reported, “Oh, my God, there are two spines in there!”
“I couldn’t believe it,” said Kathy. “I thought it had to be a mistake. I asked, ‘What have we done to deserve this?’ We were having too much fun. Now we had to get down to business.”
“How special and wonderful,” Wayne added. “We felt so blessed. We actually feel sorry for people who only have single children. Twins are such a special gift. It’s the most amazing interaction. They always seem to be having a great time, such an amazing bond. And they always have each other’s back. It explains so much about life. Plus, it helps our marriage. The boys get over their fights in just 30 seconds. But the first year is tough — it’s brutal. We were up every night. I had to drink ice coffee every day just to get through my teaching lessons. We never slept. Roger is going to have to plan and organize.”
“Yeah,” joked Kathy. “That’s just what he needs.”
Wayne continued, “You have to have high energy but he will have a lot of help. At first, it’s not two times harder than having a single kid it is three times as hard. But once kids are one or two they start to play with each other then it is easier than having just one kid. This is just hilarious. I hope Roger’s twins are identical because identical twins are such studies in human relations and genetics. Plus, you have to be so equalitarian. If I compliment Bob’s forehand, I’ve got to then say something nice about Mike’s volley.”
Bottom line: no matter how many nurses, nannies, and travel agents the Federers call in to help, they will be busy folks.
