Fore the Love of the Game

Back in March I broke my wrist.  It happened the day before I was to leave on a holiday to Phoenix to, among other things, play golf.  That in and of itself was heartbreaking, but even more devastating was the news that come May, when most of my buddies start to hit the course here in Name-of-Town-Withheld, I would not be able to play.  Apparently, broken bones take more than six weeks to heal.  I resigned myself to a summer of no real golf, but with the faint hope that I might be able to pitch and putt a few holes now and then towards the end of the summer. Luckily, however,  I got the "all clear" to start golfing in earnest last week.

My relationship with golf has been somewhat sporadic and very much of the "love/hate" variety. I started golfing during my practice marriage and I thought it would be a nice way to spend time with my husband.  Unfortunately, the ex loved to golf with his mother (no, I was not married to Norman Bates, but sometimes it felt awfully close) and they both loved to give free advice, usually during my backswing.   The horror of this experience was surpassed only by that of having to eat tomato aspic and pretend that I liked it for four years - it put me off for awhile.

Then I moved on, and I moved here, to Name-of-Town-Withheld.  Our golf course is, to say the least, unique.  The fairways are sand and it is like walking on a beach.  Golfers carry with thema rectangular mat made of astroturf.  The ball is lifted from where is lies and placed on the mat, and then the golfer takes his or her stroke.  The mats can be used anywhere on the course, although they are not usually used on the putting surface.  It all seemed like a lot of work and when  coupled with biblical-sized swarms of black flies and mosquitos,  and so my interest simply wasn't piqued.

But then, the bug bit me.  It helped that Arnie lived to golf and I had to learn something about it just so we had something to talk about in the summertime.  My friend Sandy asked me to come to Ladies' Night, which she organized at the time and gradually, we started golfing two or three times a week.  We were equally matched (although I have never been able to touch her short game) and it was fun to play together, even though my score on nine holes was typically more than many golfers shot on a full round of eighteen.  

I used to wonder what it was that pulled us back to the course, or kept us going to the end, even after having a particularly crappy round.   It's not like we could play for money, or sit around the club house and brag about our round.  Although it is a bit better now, in the early days I likened my golf game to the one you have with that "guy" you don't want your friends and parents to meet:  the dirty little secret who embarrasses you in public but who, every once in awhile,  and just enough to keep you hangin' around, does something so amazing that your knees get weak.  It's those "knee-weakening" shots that keep us coming back.  They are the 38 foot putts and the 2oo yard drives, the chips into the hole and the second shots that sometimes land on the green.  The more of them we experience, the more we crave, and the more of those shots we have.  It's a vicious cycle.  Indeed, there is only one other thing in the world that, for me, equates to the feeling I get after I smash a ball off the tee box right in the sweet spot, but since my parents sometimes read this, I'll stop there.

If you have a bad game, there is always Hole 19: the club house, where you can indulge in good golf club food and drink.  If it's really bad, you can go to the pro shop and buy stuff, like shoes, hats, gloves and even a new putter, chipper or driver, if the game has been particularly awful.  It's the "flowers and candy" of the athletic world - there's nothing like a new outfit to make you forgive the course and love your game again.

And, when all else fails to motivate me, I think of my golfing pals, who always leave me smiling and feeling like it was all worth it!