Serena Williams Opens Up to Meghan Markle About Her Decision to Retire from Tennis
Meghan Markle surprise launched her podcast, Archetypes, today with a conversation with her friend Serena Williams. While the initial interview was ostensibly recorded before Serena announced her retirement from tennis, Meghan then called her superstar friend up to discuss the retirement news.
"I mean, you and I were texting the other day and I told you I was like, Oh, my God, it's out. It's out. The world knows that. How does it feel?" Meghan asks Serena.
"Well, you know, I've struggled with it for a while. I don't know. I was just saying to someone, I'm going to be crying at everything. And so don't think I'm sad," Serena replies. "I've been doing this since I was, since I can remember. And I'm 40 years old now, so it's like my whole entire being and my whole entire life has been for one purpose. So to kind of not do that anymore, it's exciting, right? I'm really looking forward to it."
Serena continues that she's never not played tennis. She tells Meghan, "Honestly, I can't wait to wake up one day and literally never have to worry about performing on such a high level and competing. And I've actually never felt that. I mean, I've had a baby and I stopped and I've had injuries, but there was always somewhere in the back of my mind that it's still a possibility. So for it to just be completely gone is—it's new territory for me. And I'm, like I said, I'm happy about it, but it's just also something that I've actually literally have never experienced in my life."
The two friends then go on to discuss what went into Serena's choice to finish her tennis career with this year's US Open—and Serena reveals Prince Harry helped her make the decision.
Here's the full exchange about Harry, and life changing decisions:
SERENA: Yeah, but you knew about it for a long time, and I talked with Harry about it a lot as well, when you know…
MEGHAN: I remember that day you were here at the house and I was like, What are you two just chatting about? It must have been like an hour...
SERENA: He was trying to knock some sense into me and I'm just like uh…
MEGHAN: I think, you know, I think both of us, or the three of us, really know that sometimes the right decision isn't the easiest decision.
SERENA: …Is the hard decision.
MEGHAN: It's a hard decision. And it takes a lot of thought and a lot of counsel and a lot of support to just go, uh uh uh and then just make the choice.
SERENA: I just wanted to just walk away quietly. And that's how I've always seen my career. Just like, all right, I wanted to leave with no goodbyes.
MEGHAN: You're not going to do that. No one, no one in the planet would let you do that. You are too loved. I mean, I and what I'm most excited about is that the last hurrah will be at the U.S. Open because it's home.
What Meghan is hinting at here, obviously, is their decision to step down as senior working members of the royal family and move to California. Perhaps Meghan will be in the crowds at Arthur Ashe to watch Serena say her final goodbyes to the sport she's dominated for decades.
Listen to the full podcast episode here:
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