Sing No Sad Songs for Her

A boy once approached Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart for advice on how to compose a symphony. Mozart told the child to stick to ballads instead.

“But you wrote symphonies when you were my age!” protested the boy.

Said Mozart: “Yes. But I didn’t have to ask how.”

And so two centuries later we come to poor, poor Jennifer Capriati. Tennis ace. Child prodigy.

Magazine cover girl at 13. Millionairess at 14. Olympic champion at 15. Petty thief at 17. In drug rehab at 18.

Oh, boo, hoo, hoo. Oh, tennis gave her “too much, too soon.” Oh, tennis rushed her into the world “before she was ready.” Oh, professional tennis “eats its young.” Oh, woe is Jennifer.

Boy, we can make up excuses for anybody, can’t we?

We excuse juvenile delinquents because they’re underprivileged. Then we forgive juvenile delinquents because they’re over privileged.

I guess it’s only the middle-class kids who have nobody to blame but themselves. Shame on you middle-class out there.

Jennifer Capriati is a punk. Women want equal rights, let’s give them equal rights. An 18-year-old man who pulled what she pulled would be called a punk. Let’s call her what she is.

Misguided? Yeah, sure. We should all be so misguided.

Listen to Carling Bassett Seguso, who knows whereof she speaks. Carling was a pro tennis phenom, a rich kid. Of Capriati she says, “It kind of appalls me when people say her childhood was taken away. I mean, the girl played one tournament a month, she went to school full-time, she had a financial situation where she could travel with her friends and her family. . . . They gave her a lot of freedom . . . and she just went a little bit nuts.”

Yes, she did. But you would never know it from reading all the drivel we’ve been reading lately. Oh, tennis starts them out too young! Oh, no child should be put in this terrible situation!

Grow up.

Child prodigies have been coming and going for 2,000 years. No, come to think of it, longer.

Most of them turn out just fine. Not all of them get busted with a crackhead in a Florida motel, or shoplift jewelry.

Shirley Temple had pressures galore as a kid. She turned out so awful, she became a U.S. diplomat. Ron Howard had heavy responsibilities as a child. He turned out so awful, he became a Hollywood director of films to which you can take your family.

But oh, poor Jennifer never had a “normal childhood.”

Henry Ford was a high school dropout. So were George Gershwin, Jack London, Frank Sinatra, Will Rogers, Mary Baker Eddy, Amedeo Modigliani, Marshal Tito, Al Pacino, Cher. I don’t recommend it, but it didn’t exactly ruin them for life.

I once asked Andre Agassi what part of childhood he missed out on because of tennis. His answer was: “The prom.”

Playing pro tennis as a child “wrecked” Andre’s life so much that he owns private airplanes, hangs out with Barbra Streisand and Brooke Shields and wears religious medallions. Yeah, Andre is such a spoiled-rotten kid that when I flew to Las Vegas to meet him, he picked me up at the airport.

People achieve at an early age. Ballerinas, pianists, these kids don’t start out at age 16. They can’t. Some can play a concerto at 4. Gymnasts can’t wait to be of voting age. They begin as children, and most of them, Mary Lou Retton, Bart Conner, Shannon Miller, turn out fine.

Figure skaters turn out fine. Peggy Fleming, Dorothy Hamill, Kristi Yamaguchi, their heads are still on straight. They were princesses who were pampered and pressured, same as Capriati. Once they became queens, they remained pretty darned regal. Merely because Tonya Harding took wrong turns doesn’t mean Oksana Baiul will.

Chris Evert is a responsible adult. Who started younger? You think Joe DiMaggio had pressure being a public figure? Evert was recognized worldwide. The woman couldn’t walk through Bulgaria unrecognized. Surprisingly, she never robbed any stores. She became a champion, businesswoman and mother. Poor, maladjusted Chrissie.

Tracy Austin turned out OK, too. Austin won the U.S. Open at 16. She later wrote: “But I am haunted by the thought that I had to leave the game so young. The last time I played Wimbledon, I was 19. To see all the talent God gave me go unused troubles me.”

Yet the last time I bumped into Tracy, I went away thinking: Now there goes one pleasant, mature person.

Tennis didn’t fail Jennifer Capriati. Society didn’t fail Jennifer Capriati. Child labor laws didn’t fail Jennifer Capriati.

Capriati failed Capriati.

She is an adult, not a child. Some kids with bad backgrounds turn out good, some kids with good backgrounds turn out bad.

I went to a U.S. Open once where Capriati announced her new association as spokeswoman--sorry, spokesgirl--for Oil of Olay skin cream. She was 14. Let’s assume it didn’t make her thin-skinned. This is no girl now. She’s a grown woman. She has had breaks others would kill to have, breaks others have killed to have. Save your pity.

Some kids have natural talent and need to let it out. At 2, supposedly, baby Mozart heard a pig squeal.

“G-sharp,” he said.

Were he around today, somebody would tell Mozart to lay off the pro song writing tour until he was, oh, 22 and had his bachelor’s degree.