Golf Epiphanies

     I have a few recordings on my iPhone 5c from my last round of golf, some epiphanies I had.  I need to get those in here, and I also earned one more birdie during that same round.

Aztec Municipal Golf Course-Hole #1-Birdie #41 of 2016

     I played by myself on Thursday.  I let Bruce and C.J. know I was heading out, but they didn’t reply, so I went on my own anyway.  This birdie started the round with a bang, but as it continued it fizzled.  

     My drive was shorter than usual, but I did it hit the fairway to the right of the tree.  I pulled my 5-iron for the next shot, but only to help keep it low and not for the distance.  I aimed up the right side, but my club dug into the ground before my ball causing it to only skitter forward past the tree another 30 yards, but I was still on the fairway.  The flag was on the right side, and I used my 9-iron next, but I pulled it and I wasn’t even sure if had made the green.  My ball bounced up on top of the hill on the left side and disappeared.  I was pleasantly surprised to find it on the green, but I had a long (forty to fifty feet) and difficult putt that needed to go up the ridge.  The green was still sandy, and I picked a brown spot where a ball mark had once been.  When my ball curved to the left and fell in the hole, I made an expletive.  I said, “Sh*%.”

     It just came out because...

     I was surprised.  Just like my recent putt on #12, I had no intention of making it, so when it went in, an uncontrolled cuss word flew out of my mouth.  Good thing I was alone.  Then I smiled, knowing I had gotten away with one (the putt, not the cuss word).

Without checking those recordings, I can remember what I said.  First, I noticed things about the golf course that probably few people, except the ones who work or play as often as we do there, would know.  

     

     For example, on hole #4, the number of smaller trees to the right of the green is four.  Eight poplars separate holes #17 and #9.  From hole #5’s white teeing ground, a clear view of the brick building on #17 is available.  I am pretty sure I could play the golf course successfully (to my handicap) without the yardage markers anymore.  Playing hole #3’s fairway is still advantageous to playing #18’s fairway when playing hole #18.  If the golf course goes under, we will be the ones who will miss it the most, the ones who know these little idiosyncrasies of the Aztec Municipal Golf Course.

     I also mentioned that when playing golf, we are all at the whim of fate, or what others would call “the golf gods.”  I can play with my full attention and desire, but things can still go horribly wrong.  I can make a terrible swing with little or no coordination and have my ball  go in the hole.  It’s paradoxical.  I was having a lousy start to my round when I recorded that.  I started with the birdie mentioned above, but things went awry soon after, and I went double bogey, double bogey on the next two holes, and that included missing two putts on hole #4 from less than three feet.  Argh!  It reminded me that the only reason I would choose to be happy during a miserable round is because it will make a future incredible round feel more…incredible.  Experiencing sadness and heartbreak can make the feelings of joy even sweeter.

     When I got to hole #9, I was full of sadness and heartbreak.  That sounds too dramatic; I was bummed about my play.  There, that’s more honest.   My score was ballooning, and I had written these words on my scorecard, “triple-putt, ditch, four-putt.”  Then I used my driver on #9 and everything was fine again with one swing.  Sometimes, one swing is all it takes to go from utter misery (or being bummed out) to complete jubilation.