I love to golf simply because it gets me outdoors. Driving a cart, drinking a cold beer and scoping out squirrels is heavenly. The game itself is the most frustrating game ever invented by man. So frustrating that therapy sessions and confession may be needed. And I am not even Catholic. It’s frustrating when you can only hit a ball 20 yards with each shot. By the count of twenty I am on the green, then another 20 putts later I’m near (not in) the hole. “Gimme” and “Mulligan” are two of my favorite words.
Now, on occasion, those parties behind me are a little less patient than I. They play their shots that come rolling past me and never shout out “fore!” That’s when I use my own form of therapy. I conveniently knock their balls back to the rough, sand or a water hazard. Amazingly, I can hit the ball straight and long with their shots. It’s fun watching them shout and curse as they try to find their shots. I feel much better as I forge ahead.
But the game itself is not therapeutical at all. I take practice swings, layout a calculus stance, wiggle my hiney and still slice it into the woods or lodge it to someone’s nice new stucco job. Well, at least I can! I’ve played football, basketball, softball, tennis, ping-pong and never had the same frustrations as I have had with golfing. I’ve come close to killing my father and a few friends, and, with much guilt, one poor squirrel. I’ve dug fox holes and left craters with my shots. I’ve spun around like a ballerina while completely missing a swing and have fallen into the water hazard trying to save a drowning ball.
To make matters worse, golf is getting too expensive. There is little money left after a game to continue the therapy at the 19th hole, which is where all golfers work feverishly to get to. They rush their games, curse at each stroke and then joke about it at the lounge. We have to joke because our game sucks! We watch the pros and reminisce about the one shot we had in 200 that was of a professional caliber. I, for one, recall over and over the long put that hit the hole. I don’t continue with the story about how it went over the hole and kept going and going like a heat-seeking-squirrel-destroying projectile.
This is why now I only go to the driving range and putting green. There I even have enough money remaining for therapeutical liquids and can tell my stories gloriously at the 19th hole. Ahh, I feel much better now!
