Serena Williams is GQ’s Woman of the Year and Champion of the Year. We already talked about the stupid Virgil Abloh thing of putting “woman” in quotes, which is still shady. On Thursday, GQ released Serena’s full cover interview and woooo, it’s a good read. Keep in mind that Serena hasn’t played a professional match since the US Open final, a final which I called “the most shambolic sports moment of the year.” There was so much happening in that confined space – racism, sexism, sh-tty umpiring, tennis politics, gender politics, race politics, and more. Serena has spoken since then, and while she’s sounded vaguely apologetic at times, I also get the sense that she’s still just upset about everything that went down, and the chaotic aftermath. This interview was conducted maybe a month after the final, around the time of Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination. You can read the full GQ piece here. Some highlights:

Bad stuff always happens to her at the US Open. “I’ve had a lot of things happen to me at the U.S. Open. I think about three or four different things. Especially in the later rounds. I think a person can be a little bit more sensitive to anything in that moment. You know, it becomes a trigger moment. When you go through a really extreme ordeal not once, not twice, not three times, it becomes a trigger moment.”

On the first violation, the coaching violation: She would like to make one thing clear about Ramos hitting her with the coaching code violation. It wasn’t typical. Usually, if an umpire notices a player’s coach making suspicious movements (in tennis, coaches are not allowed to, well, coach during the match), he’ll simply say something to the player and that’s the end of it. “That was where a lot of people don’t understand. That’s where I was coming from. Like, usually you talk to me, tell me that something’s happening, and I’ll tell my box, like, whatever you’re doing, don’t. First, I can’t see you—I’m clear on the other side of the court. Second, don’t do it. We’re here to win or to lose with dignity, and that’s how I’ve always done my career.” To be accused of cheating, and eventually docked a point for it, was an injustice.

A woman who expresses anger: “Especially a black woman. You do research on how black women, you know, in the workforce are, there’s literally papers about it, how black women are treated if they’re angry, as opposed to white women, white men, black men. It is bottom of the bottom of the totem pole.”

On how Brett Kavanaugh’s “anger” was applauded & rewarded: “Kavanaugh’s a white man. I’m a black woman. His limit is higher. My limit is way lower. And that’s where we stand right now in this world. And it’s a fact. It is literally a fact. If you don’t believe anything I say, just look at those two examples…. You don’t accept it. You talk out about it like I have. You make it better for the next generation.” She talks about the continuum, about Rosa Parks, “or you look at people like Althea Gibson, who had to sleep in her car.” In 1956, Althea Gibson became the first African-American to win a Grand Slam title, and the next year she won two more, despite the fact that hotels and country clubs still excluded blacks and so she was routinely banned from clubhouses. Also she was broke. There was no prize money for women in tennis, no professional tours. That was awful. But that was for her generation, and she bore the burden for someone like me. I have it way better than she does. And then I’m bearing the burden for the next generation, and they’re going to have it way, way better than I do.”

Her self-improvement, what she’s working on: “That is something that I need to personally work on. Everyone has to work on something. I’m still learning to embrace being, for lack of a better word, great. I did buy myself a cake the other day. I never have cake. I went to bed thinking I want a cake, and I want, like, a decorated cake.” She pulls out her phone, swipes, finds the picture, and shows it to me—a mini cake, single serving, white icing, abundant yellow flowers, flowing ribbons of purple sugar. “Maybe it was my celebration to myself? I felt really happy to have that cake and eat it.”

[From GQ]

For the record, I don’t think Serena has been sitting around Palm Beach, stewing 24-7 about what happened with Carlos Ramos. I think she’s been training and spending time with Olympia and preparing for Australia. And I think she’s been reflecting a lot about her career, and yes, what has happened to her throughout her career, and how she’s been treated differently by many different people. She’s not wrong to make the US Open controversy discussion about anger, female anger, and even more specifically, how men react to a justifiably angry black woman. She’s right about all of it, and even in the hours, days, weeks and months that followed, she was still painted as “out of control” and “bratty” and “weak” and a lot worse.

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Photo and cover courtesy of GQ.