#thinkpiece

Sports rivals, particularly in individual sports, are incredibly intimate. Case in point: The Sinner-Alcaraz tennis rivalry.

It is in the fact that there will never be anyone who truly understands me except for you. It is in the fact that our lives will be intertwined together for as long as we live, and then even after that. Our names will be carved alongside each other on the trophies that generations and generations after us will hold. It is in the fact that one of us cannot be mentioned without the other and in that you can bring me the greatest joy imaginable but also grief to the greatest extent.

Everything is about tennis except for tennis, which is about love. Love of tennis, love for your opponent, love for glory. Even in the technical terms of tennis, there is love-fifteen, love-thirty and so on. Love bleeds everywhere and stains everything in the sport. There will always be love between us because I fell for your tennis first and vice-versa. We first met when I was eighteen and you were fifteen, and I lost after a grueling three-set match, yet I said that I hoped we would play some more. Even though I lost, even though I never said things like that, and the arena was so loud I had to repeat it a second time because you couldn't hear me. It was because you were that good. I wanted you to know that. Because you were so fun to play against and at the core of professional sports is the love for the sport and you made me love the sport even more.

That match would describe our future rivalry, in that we would play each other many times and I would lose and you win, and then I would win and you lose. But even in the grief of losing, I would still want to keep playing you.

I will change my playing style solely for the reason of becoming better, to beat you. I will introduce more variety into my game because that is what I need to do, to beat you. In the moments of waking and falling asleep, I think of you and tennis. It is the intimacy of changing myself, because I am tennis and tennis is my life, my number one, my obsession, and I will change it for you. Besides that, I love studying you. Studying how you play, learning from it. I will learn and learn and perhaps take a few things from your playstyle, tweak myself here and there, and you will too, and there will come a day, maybe only for a second or two, or maybe for a lapse in time, where our tennis will merge and become indistinguishable. And because we are tennis and tennis is our very soul, we will become indistinguishable, too.

I love watching you play. You are one of, if not my favourite people to watch, even though watching you play must bring me some grief because the way you play is the way you beat me and I hate being beaten. Watching you play is like watching a better version of myself, which I hate because I am a perfectionist and I want to be the best and you are the one standing in my way.

I would not want you to play badly, even if it meant winning. I want you to play at 100%, and myself at 100%, because to not do so is a dishonour to the other person, an insult to the capability of the other. It is a lack of respect to not give your best and challenge me. I want to win and I want to win fairly because winning while you are not pushing me to be the best, to my limits, above the edge of the atmosphere because the sky is not the limit when we are playing each other, would taint my victory and sour the taste. Because the foundation of our rivalry is how we both desire the same thing equally but only one of us can have it and we will fight tooth and nail, rip each other's throats out for a taste of victory.

There are not many things, I think, as joyful and freeing as winning in sport, as being at the top, at the greatest height of glory. There is love between us, an emotional bond. But we are rivals first and foremost. It means that I love you very much, because you are my rival, the other side of the coin, my reflection in the mirror. I am a mosaic of everyone I have ever loved, and you are the emblema. We are opposites, soulmates, put on earth and fated to meet so that we can push each other to our fullest potential and even beyond that. But. But. Love for myself must always outweigh love for you. Because once I see you on the other side of the net, it is either you or me, not you and me. My love for you is bound by something, by grief and heartbreak. But love for glory and the trophy has no chain attached to it. The high of winning a tournament will not drag me below the surface, but if I were to choose to love you more than myself, you would drag me down, not intentionally but because there is no possibility for total selflessness in a rivalry. I have to be selfish. There is some misery to it, to not be able to experience pure joy while winning and grief while losing. Because my emotions are not mine, not in my control. When I win, there is grief because the person I love has lost due to me. When I lose, there is grief because I have lost (due to the person I love). There will always be grief in that the sweetness of victory will always have an aftertaste of bitterness, or that the bitterness of losing will always have an aftertaste of sweetness. So it is up to which outweighs which: love for glory or love for companionship. And love for glory will always win because to be an elite sportsman is to have the hunger to win, and keep on winning.

But also, my love for you is wholly dependent on both our abilities to win. That we are on par, equals, that you are able to beat me but I am able to beat you too. There is a deep-rooted respect I have for you, and your abilities, your abilities especially. It hurts to lose and even more so to you because it is you. And you lead our head-to-head 10-6, and what if I never catch up? What if you are, in fact, better than me, and will always be better than me? Leave me in the dust, not at the top but above the others below me. So that I am alone with no companionship and I can win and win but never against you specifically. I will always be second place and that is what will haunt me the most. To be average. The gnawing ache to win will never be satisfied, and I will be photographed holding a silver tray while you hold your gleaming golden trophy. That in itself symbolises something too, that you are bright and shining and perfect, and I will seem lowly next to you with my dull trophy tray, that my sole purpose is to make you shine brighter. To be second is to be the first of losers and I never want to experience that. But I will. Because of you.

Playing you is like playing a deuce. Back and forth, back and forth. I hate deuces, because it requires me to win two times in a row, even three. There is no room for mistakes. But it is exhilarating to win a deuce. It means I am better than you, was better than you, for that split second. Even if it is by a narrow margin, for a milisecond, I have achieved what I strive for, which is to be better than you. But when you win the deuce, I feel it is useless, that playing to the best of my ability has no effect on you whatsoever and you are simply better than me. I cannot cope with that, because that will destroy the narrative of what will probably be the rest of my life.

I think that perhaps I do not want to be better than you by a lot, by a mile, and I would prefer to be better than you by an inch, maybe. I want a rival. Or do I? Would I trade companionship, the push and pull, the high of winning against a rival, because it is especially delicious to win against you, the way I will keep improving beyond my ceiling out of sheer willpower because I live to beat you? Or would I rather be better by a mile and a mountain, to never be challenged, but also to be alone at the very top and never really push past my ceiling because there is no need to, and victory wouldn't taste as sweet because there is no real challenge, I am just always winning? And if I were to choose the latter, it begs the question: Am I good or are the rest just bad? Which would destroy me if the answer were that the others are just bad, because it means my achievements have no substance whatsoever.

I say I would like to win fairly, truly. However, when you were injured in Turin, and returned with a bandage, I served the ball differently, to make you run, to test out your weakness, to take advantage of your injury and dip in abilities. It makes me wonder if I would like to win unfairly or not win at all. And then because it was still a tight match, would you have won if you weren't injured? But that is the cost of winning. So many “ifs”, but “if” does not exist. If the wind was in the right direction, I would've won. If I had my serve that day, I would've won. If the sun wasn't in my eyes, I would've won. That is what I will tell myself, to justify that, because life is unfair and winning is unfair and sometimes those who deserve to win will not win. But who is to say who deserved to win?

Perhaps I am Icarus, and you are the sun. In that due to being in close proximity with you, I have fallen in many ways. I have fallen in love with your tennis, with you. But I have also fallen in the sense that I am below you now. I flew too close to you, played a little too tight. And suddenly I am falling, falling into the depths of grief and heartbreak. However, like Icarus, the exhilaration of playing with you is too much and I think that I would fly too close to the sun again and again, and fall again and again, knowing the consequences. But then I would resent you, probably. Because you have caused me grief and you are beating me and yet I cannot stay away. There is an invisible string between us and one cannot stray too far without the other following. So we will keep spiraling into each other, spiraling because perhaps I am the sun to you and you are Icarus instead, and we will not be able to stop, even to our own detriment.

What I mean is that I love tennis, and you are the very definition of tennis. The passion, the talent, the glory, and therefore, I love you. What I mean is that I love winning, and you are the obstacle in the path to victory, and therefore, I resent you. I strive for perfection and you are the thing pushing me towards perfection but also standing in the way of it. What I mean is that the hypocrisy with which I speak, which very few people understand, and I myself also do not fully understand, is understood by you. To be loved is to be seen, and I think that maybe you are the only person who can fully understand what I am trying to articulate, and therefore you love me, too.

Did anyone else notice the sudden—but not entirely surprising—regression in Gerri Kellman’s wardrobe choice in the finale of Succession? (Pardon the low-res image; I couldn’t get a proper screenshot.)

After seasons of sharp, C-suite-worthy suits and intentional jewelry, her return to the now GoJo-acquired Waystar looks… muted. She’s back in something closer to her old uniform: “invisible, like wallpaper, boring old sort of nothing, like a competent clever filing cabinet that everyone seems content to have around.” The cut is almost military-utilitarian. The overall effect is designed not to offend anyone—even though, yes, it’s still Emporio Armani.

And with Succession, we already know this isn’t accidental. Everything we see on screen has been thought through. Even the costumes are extensions of a character’s interior state, their strategy, and their place in the packing order. So Gerri’s outfit in the finale reads more like a deliberate choice: the re-donning of her chameleon skin.

She’s treading lightly. Navigating the possibility of reclaiming her old role while sizing up her new “soft” and “sick on vacation mania” colleagues. This is Gerri making herself nonthreatening again.

But what happens when she does get her role back?

It’s clear that nothing about Waystar Royco will ever be the same under Matsson's control. The vikings are steering the ship now. Which made me wonder: how does Gerri Kellman adapt in a GoJo-acquired Waystar Royco? This is my attempt to visualize some parts of her in that universe.

We already saw hints of her experimenting with Scandinavian fashion back in S4E5—mostly dictated by Norway’s weather. But New York is a different battlefield. More than the climate, it’s about culture. The nature of the business has shifted, and the kind of talent being onboarded has changed. Suddenly you have Norwegian sensibilities crossing the Atlantic, landing squarely on the East Coast.

So Gerri does what Gerri always does. She adapts. Ever the chameleon, she recalibrates her look to match the new power: a crossover of tech-world casualness and Scandinavian precision, but still grounded in her signature polish. She drops the severity and ruthlessness of corporate New York. She looks relaxed and approachable—yet still not careless or weak.

As for her new office—and everyone else’s—the Nords bring their utilitarian-minimalist design ethos with them. All executives' offices look the same. It’s a shock to the retained employees who were raised on the old Waystar culture, but a clear perk for the younger hires the new regime is courting.

No personal items on desks. No territorial markers. You can sit anywhere, take over any table as needed. Power no longer announces itself through awards or framed certificates on the wall. If you’re a leader, your presence has to do the talking. And that, of course, suits Gerri just fine. She has never needed any props, anyway.

This is where my thoughts on Gerri Kellman begin after GoJo. If you have a different take on who she becomes in this new order, I’d genuinely love to hear it! Perhaps I can even work on visualizing it.

Tiles and drains all over the house so he doesnt risk rotted wood, having those gloves for cats that help with fur shedding so he can pet them without getting them wet.

jean was raised by his family alongside his sister. he given up by his parents at 14 and never saw his sister again

andrew, in contrast, was given up as a baby without ever knowing aaron and only met him in person when they were ~14 (iirc…didn’t fact check this part, sorry). he’d never known him before that

It's no secret she's fame/relevance hungry but there's nothing immoral about wanting attention. However, the means she chooses to garner the attention she craves is where the more palatable of her dubious decisions occur. For instance, her 2016 tbt whereby she reminded us all of her [redacted] claim that there was 'something magical' that night her (27) and Max (19) met. Adding how Max claimed she was the love of his life the day after meeting. It's questionable as to why she'd choose to draw attention to it, after the dust has somewhat settled.

I suppose entertaining a teenagers infatuation at 27 years old (when said teenager is also participating in a sport your family has generational ties to), doesn't exactly paint a picturesque meet cute. So reality had to be altered to take the appearance of something that could be envied, sweet and pure love at first sight perhaps. I believe the desperation to repaint the narrative in a rose-tinted shade drove her to that post, which has ultimately backfired.

Yet, somehow the strangest part of the entire post was implying she was behind a burner account called Serendipity1818, which is most notable for attempting to spread a rumor that Max is actually the father of her (Kelly's) first child. Disregarding whether she’s the account owner or not (due to the account posting a photo of them not previously public, it seems likely she is), shining the spotlight back on an old rumor, one that directly involves her daughter, is so shameless.

It's one thing to exploit and extract every last drop of marketable value out of Max, but out of her child who has no say in their own circumstances is pathetic. Not the first time she has exploited her child either, considering she repeatedly posted topless photos/videos of her at a young age. How anyone, especially a parent, could ever think that's okay when the internet is crawling with creeps is beyond me. When weighing up internet fame vs the protection of a child’s privacy, I would have hoped there would be no competition.