It’s autumn in Northeast Ohio and another season of golf
has come to an end. Fortunately, I was
able to play all the golf I wanted this year. Which interestingly enough was
the same amount of golf I have played the previous 12 years – none.
You see, I’m a terrible golfer. I know many people say that, but they are
merely bad golfers. I however, am truly a
horrendous, gawd-awful, putrid golfer. I
should had quit the game years before I did. I will now publicly apologize to
anyone I have ever golfed with or anyone who has suffered pain or property damage
from one of my errant shots. I am sorry, I am oh so sorry.
Some guys will sit in the nursing home regretting that they
worked too much and did not play enough golf.
I will be sitting beside them regretting that I played any golf at all. And it’s not like I played a lot of golf,
because I hate golfing. Hate it oh so badly.
I began playing in high school because my good friend John
golfed and it looked like fun. I kept
playing occasionally because friends would invite me or there would be work
events in which you were “expected” to participate. Where your value as a business person would
somehow depend on your skill as a golfer. Needless to say, my golfing ability
never advanced my career, on the contrary, it may have helped to sink it – just
like my normal tee shot on the 4th hole at the Legends Golf Course
where you shoot over, (whoops!) where you are supposed to shoot over the lake.
I once even joined a golf league at church since it seemed
like the Christian, holy, fellowship-type thing to do. Even when provided with an astronomical
handicap, my partner and I finished in last place both years I played. I did make my mark on the league though. Early in the second season, my partner Steve moved
to South Dakota. I’m sure he did leave to take a new job and not to avoid
finishing last again due to my awful scores.
I replaced him with my friend from work, Roger. But Roger had a quirk. If he hit a bad shot, he swore. Even if he
hit it a good shot, he swore. Roger
liked to swear on the golf course and *#%&!!*, he sure swore a lot. While it
was highly amusing to me, it was somehow not appreciated in church league
golf. Between my atrocious play and
Roger’s potty mouth, I decided it was best for all involved to quit while I was
behind.
I played golf on and off for over 30 years. I would golf, golf terribly, and then quit
the game. Inexplicably, I would try again.
I first golfed left-handed (the way I swing a baseball bat), then
right-handed, then left-handed again and finally the last 15 years or so,
right-handed. I would joke and tell
people that I could golf equally well right or left handed. They would be impressed until they witnessed my
tee shot. And I say “witnessed”, because the way I swing a golf club is a
crime.
It is also interesting that my last round of golf was just
as terrible as my first In 30 years of
trying to improve my game, I failed and I failed miserably. And I did make an effort to improve, but I never
did. I couldn’t even work my way up from
horrible to “fair”. Of anything I have ever attempted to do in life, golf is my
biggest failure.
At one point I even bought golf shoes, just like a good
golfer. As if the shoes ever had the ability to improve my horrible game. These shoes would have had to possess more
magical powers than Dorothy’s ruby slippers. “There’s no place like (the) hole”.
The whole idea of striking a golf ball never made sense to
me. The poor ball is just sitting there
on the tee waiting for you to wallop it.
But you can’t just wallop it. You
have to keep your knees bent, head down, elbow in, eye on the ball, blah, blah,
blah. You also must clear your mind of
all distractions and focus exclusively on all the mechanics required for a
smooth shot. I’m intelligent enough to
know what I am supposed to do. But
somewhere between approaching the ball and hitting it a voice inside my head will
drown out everything else. “KILL IT! KILL IT NOW! KILL IT BEFORE IT RUNS
AWAY!
So evidently my primal instincts believe the ball is food
and must be subdued before it flees. And
even though I know it is wrong, I swing as hard as I can at that weak,
defenseless ball and it goes flying off in some random direction. Golfing with me was dangerous, but my fellow
linksters soon learned that the safest place to stand when I hit an approach
shot was on the green by the pin and they would point that out to me. Those pompous bass-turds!
But I don’t have to worry about it anymore because this
summer I gave away my clubs. They had sat in the garage, neglected for the past
13 years. They would often mock me when
I walked past. “Hey doofus, why don’t you use us? We know why! Because you suck at golf! Boy do
you suck! My young friend Colin, was taking up golf and looking for a cheap set
of clubs. I was so eager to get rid of these things that I gave him my clubs
(except for my putter which I kept for miniature golf). No need to pay, just remove this from my
life! Usually
I have feelings when parting
with objects that have sentimental value. But oddly, maybe sadly, I felt
nothing as Colin drove away with my clubs.
I later messaged him to find out how his golf game is progressing, but there
was no reply. Perhaps my atrocious golf skills
somehow got ingrained into those clubs.
Poor Colin! He probably sucks at golf and it’s my fault.
 |
| All that is left of my golf stuff |
I never, ever enjoyed playing golf. It was like going to
the dentist. I endured it, but I was so glad when the round was over. Why was
it ever important to me to become a proficient golfer? Oh the good golfers will
inflate it’s importance, because they are of course, good at it. Some will even say your manhood depends on a
low golf score. But what is golf,
really? It is hitting an object, with a
stick, at a target. In a sense, it is just glorified croquet.
Attaining a great golf swing creates no really useful skill
whatsoever. Cavemen probably hit rocks
with tree limbs for utter amusement and then the Scots eventually turned it
into a game. No, not a sport, a
game. And in our wacked out culture we
create special sticks to strike the object which can cost up to $1,300 each. We also pay millions of dollars to our golf-gods
who have mastered striking the object with these expensive sticks. This would even confuse a caveman. “Ugg! Me hooked it!
Stupid branch.”
However, a while back I saw a meme which read: “The object
of golf is to play the least amount of golf”.
Brilliant! How pleasurable can an
activity be if the goal is to do it less?
This would imply that it is a dreadful, useless game which should be
avoided at all costs.
This revelation changed my outlook on golf entirely. I am not a horrible golfer. I am a masterful golfer because over the last
13 years, none of these so called skilled linksters has played less golf than I
have.
With this new, profound perspective, I immediately booked a
trip to Augusta National Golf Club, home of the Masters Tournament. My
scorecard from the day is shown below:
As you can see, I had a most exemplarily round. I mastered the dog leg to the left on Hole #5
by doggone leaving it alone. I made a
tremendous approach shot on #7 by hitting my none-iron and skillfully avoided
the pond on #16 by circumventing the hole all together. If fact, I evaded every hazard on the course
and didn’t miss a putt. This enabled me
to proceed directly to the clubhouse bar and talk some jive with the barmaids.
It was just a fantastic day.
The life lesson here is to not waste your time, effort and
resources on things you do not really enjoy and will never have proficiency in.
Instead, find those things that bring you joy and experience these to the
fullest. So I encourage those great
golfers to continue to strike that object, with that stick, to hit that
target. You do it well and I’m glad you
enjoy it. But I will not be joining you
on the links (which is beneficial and much safer for you), because I literally
have better things, for me, to do.
No comments:
Post a Comment