Sharon Murphy lived in a house full of books, and when her eyesight started to fail in her 70s, she had to make some changes. The books had to go, thousands of them. There were classes to attend: how to get around her apartment and the city, how to manage paperwork and use a computer.

She went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art for a session that helps blind and visually impaired people appreciate the collection. There, she heard of something that stopped her: blind tennis.

Really? Blind tennis?

Ms. Murphy had never played tennis, or sports in general. But this piqued her curiosity. “Tell me more,” she said.

So on a Saturday morning this spring, she made her way to the Sound of Tennis, where blind and visually impaired players convene free of charge at Court 16, a tennis and pickleball club with three branches in New York City. For Ms. Murphy, 81, that first lesson offered more than just tennis.

“It opened a world of possibilities,” she said the other day, near her home on the Upper West Side. Ms. Murphy has a warm manner and lights up when she talks about her adventures on the court.