Tahl Leibovitz, the official Team USA Portrait
This is my story. A story of how my determination to become a top professional table tennis competitor helped me overcome the stigma of being physically disabled and survive the obstacles of homelessness and petty crime.
-Tahl Leibovitz
The Book of Tahl; From Homelessness to Paralympic Gold
I was already a tennis player when I arrived at UC Berkeley, but my boyfriend, Jim, had never seen a tennis racket before, not a decent one anyway. We were in love so, naturally, I decided to teach him how to play. Never having had the opportunity, he had no idea he'd be good at racket sport, very good. I had always been a competitive athlete "for a girl," and I wasn't going to subsume my competitive spirit to a guy, even to a guy I was in love with. It was very frustrating because Jim was a hot shot the minute his racket touched the ball, and I never got a game off him once he learned how to play.
Fast forward to our decade-long sojourn in London where Jim became a squash player, and then in New York where he took up racquet ball. And then one day he got hit on the left ear with the dense, hard racquet ball and developed vertigo. He'd been in the navy on a ship for a couple of years so the swaying sensation was familiar, but every athlete loathes injury if it means lay-off , and Jim was miserable. Off he went one day for a swaying walk up 86th street between Second and Third Avenue where he found a pool hall. At the very back were several table tennis tables and a tall guy giving lessons. That was it, he was hooked. Here was a racquet sport he could play forever, and all over the world.
Years passed and Jim met Tahl Lebovitz, who became one of his coaches. Tahl had a back story that resonated with Jim. They both had similar hardships in childhood because of abusive parents: Tahl had been homeless, Jim spent some of his growing up years in foster care. But it wasn't only their rough childhoods that drew them into a trusting collaboration; they both have physical disabilities—Tahl has bone tumors and Jim had polio that left one side of his body smaller than the other, not as serious as Tahl's disability, but serious enough. Both are disciplined avid table tennis players though Jim will never be able to get a game off Tahl, which must be divine justice. Tahl also competes against able-bodied players and is a member of the US Paralympic Team; he's just home from Paris as I write and his memoir, completed before his departure, is now published and available online: The Book of Tahl
There's always a story behind a story, and this is Jim's and Tahl's and his wife Dawn's, who loves to sing at church, and mine, too, as I have watched the relationship between these two remarkable men deepen over the months of working together on Tahl's book. Tahl's story, and the honor of publishing his memoir, has lifted our spirits, as I am sure it will lift yours.