I’m not sure how to process this one yet from my golf round yesterday. The morning round @ Plantation Golf Club was memorable because for the very first time I shot a score of 84. That number, “84”, now lives in infamy [with me]. I remember marrying for the first time in the year 1984, but it was short and from what I recall that didn’t end too well. The only good news was neither one of us had anything substantial to split or bicker over. Looking back on all this I have to admit that the times I spent broke and losing battles formed the basis that literally lifted me up to win an eventual war. Going through tough times prepared me to find the strength required to kick ass later, [or something like that]. Had I not suffered hard times when I was young I would have never elevated myself to a-n-y-t-h-i-n-g. So for that I will always be grateful. My experience has been that personal fails make the best teachers [in life], and it’s the same way in golf. When life gets tough, are you listening? When your game gets tough just taking a step back and confronting when you suck, or that things suck, these incidents serve as great signals; listening to and understanding these signals is key. Many times our first impressions can make us throw in the towel and quit too early when actually the opposite is the correct medicine. Growing is improving and there’s nothing better than failure followed by hard work because it pays a large reward; having the sense to keep on keeping on through all the frustration is well, priceless and so it was and has been for me in my golf game.

My game is best described as “moments of greatness combined with equal moments of disaster”. That pretty much summed up my results on a golf course until recently. Prior to this I may have broken 90 only twice in my life. I remember before I even thought about swinging a club visiting my Dad while he spoke about spending days in retirement on a golf course and in-between judiciously watching live PGA tournaments. I asked him once what kind of scores are you achieving? His answer, “I’m usually in the high 80’s, 86 or 87”. I remember that conversation back then though I couldn’t place it under context having never played a single round. But later, after several years of rounds that conversation began to weigh on me, I mean I was having trouble even shooting a 90, much less matching his 87. FYI, par for most courses is a score of 72, 36 strokes on the front 9 plus 36 allowed to complete the back 9. Probably less than 3% of recreational golfers ever achieve this lofty level of play.

It just so happened that this particular day the coordinator had changed our normal game rules. The normal game calls for a $6 entry fee and pays out based on how well the 3-some or 4-some did on the front and back nine, and overall. The email changing the game to individual play I did not see before heading out in the morning because it was sent out too late. So I heard the news from a fellow golfer while waiting to tee off on number 1 that individual scores would count at the end of play instead of [the normal] team scores and that it was going to be a $12 entry fee. Well, once all players had returned to the clubhouse and the scores were tallied I had the best net score against my [high] handicap so I won First Place and some money!

Obtaining results on a golf course is not something that’s going to come easy [for most of us]. Plus, I’ve always been a late bloomer in life, nothing has ever come early or easy for me. It’s been that way my entire life [I’ve come to know this by now and I’m fine with it]. So golf mimics life I guess, as many sports do. I’ve spent nine years in total now, [playing more regularly since retiring two years ago] all in pursuit of that elusive lower golf score. This week marks a milestone in that journey but in no way do I consider it the end all be all because if there’s one thing I’ve learned along the way it’s that there are no “final rounds” in the game of golf.