The Insane Rantings of a Frustrated Golfer

At this point in my life, I’ve narrowed down my life’s dreams to these, in no particular order:

1. Send my kids to the U. of Notre Dame.
2. Help Barstool Sports become such a media giant that the federal government breaks us up under Anti-Trust Laws.
3. Live to 100, get shot by a jealous husband.
4. Become a good golfer.

Those are some pretty simple wishes.  I used to have others, before the constant disappointments of an unforgiving world crushed the last bit of spirit embedded in my soul.  I remember vividly one dream that died at the end of Mr. Walsh’s bench in Weymouth Farm League.  Another died the day Phoebe Cates married Kevin Kline.  But these four endured.

As long as my sons keep up with their homework and Uncle Buck keeps finding Hayden Panetierre pictures no one else can, I’ve got a shot at the first two.  The third one, only time will tell (with the help of America’s pharmaceutical companies and gun lobby).

The fourth dream?  It’s starting to slip away. 

Notice I didn’t say “I want to be a pro golfer.”  Not an amateur  tournament player.  Not even a scratch golfer.  Just “good.”  Good enough to brag about my score.  Good enough to impress my idiot friends and have them wish they were me.  Simply good.

Is that to much to ask?  I’ve wanted this as much as I’ve wanted anything for the 20-some odd years I’ve been playing.  I’m like some kind of Gentile, Docker-clad Tevye, cheesed off that me shooting in the high 70’s would spoil God’s vast eternal plan.  But I swear I’m only marginally better than the day I bought my first set of Wilson Aviators when I was in school.

Instead I’m still struggling to shoot in the upper 90s.  After all the lunch hours spent at the driving range, all the lessons on the golf channel, all the Golf Digest tip columns.  And still I’ve got a swing that looks less like Ernie Els and more like Uma Thurman fighting off the Crazy 88s.  The only thing that’s more frustrating is hearing about someone for whom the game just seems to come easy.  Just a few recent examples:

• Last week at the Austin Country Club in Texas, Issac Christianson bagged a hole-in-one on a 169-yard hole using a 23-degree hybrid club.  The ace was the first of his career.  Oh, Isaac is 11 years old.
• Jack Pountney of Brisbane, Australia had a hole-in-one in a club medal competition at Coffs Harbour Golf Club, in a round in which he shot a 100.  Even though the hole is only 170 yards, he hit a driver.  That would be because Jack is 8.
• In Chico, CA, Elsie McLean also joined the Ace Club back in April when she sank a 100 yard shot using a driver at the Bidwell Muni.  But unlike Christianson and Pountney, Elsie is no kid.  She’s 102.
• Back about five years ago, my father-in-law golfed with one of Boston’s biggest celebrity chefs.  Now this guy is an unabashed media whore.  He undoubtedly spend 16 hours a day either schmoozing the press, running his restaurant empire, counting his money or bedding lingerie models.  He told my wife’s dad he hadn’t swung a club in months.  He had an ace.  On a hole I can’t make par on.  In a round where he beat my personal best by 10 strokes.

To all you, I offer my heartfelt congratulations.  Then I hope you all die in a fire.  Seriously, F- the lot of you.  How dare anyone let golf come so easy to them when I’m consumed by it and it refuses to love me back?  And by no means does carding an Ace automatically make you a good golfer, but at this point, I’d take it.  That’s how low I’ve set the bar at this point.  But do you know how you can prove I’ve never had a hole-in-one?  Because if I did, you’d know about it.  I would’ve called you by now.  I would’ve picked up the Boston white pages, started dialing people and wouldn’t have stopped until everyone from Aaron Aaronson to Ziggy Zwicker knew about my moment of immortality.

This is a true story.  OK, mostly true.  I might have added some hyperbole.  But my home course has a bar that looks out over the 18th green.  With a good drive, it can be a short iron in, but the front of the green is protected by a pond.  It’s not an exaggeration to say that I put 9 out of 10 shots into that pond.  So much so, that the balls I’ve deposited there have started to pile up like magma coming up from the ocean floor.  They recently broke the surface of the water and formed a sovereign island nation.  The Republic of Titleist.  Next year CBS is dropping Jeff Probst and 18 nitwits on it.

Anyway, one time last year I was drinking at the bar (that part I didn’t make up) and watched a guy hit a high, arching, draw.  Just a beautiful shot that landed to the front right of the pin, then rolled up the hill and broke left until it stopped about three feet.  I watched the guy walk up with his group, grab his putter and mark his ball, and as God is my witness, he had one arm.  He hit that shot with just his left arm.

I remember thinking “What a triumph of the human spirit.  What a way to overcome obstacles.  What an inspiration.  What a friggin’ jerk.”  I mean, I’m sorry to think that, but what other reaction could I have?  I’ve never even broken a bone, and I can’t hit that shot to save my life.  Now I’m carrying a grudge against my right arm that no amount of masturbation and scratching myself can cure.  Thanks for contributing to my self-loathing, pal.

It turns out the guy shot an 82, which is beyond any reasonable hope for me, but it’s a typical round for him.  But what can you do?  Beyond resisting the urge to say something stupid (“What’s your handicap?“…“Wow, you beat those guys single-handedly”), all you can do is admire a guy like that and admit he’s twice the man you are.  Then it’s back to the driving range in hopes that your right elbow won’t fly out on the backswing and shatter your dreams once again.

I guess I could try to buy a game.  Go out and spend whatever it takes to get some top-of-the-market clubs and start putting Pro V1’s in the drink at $45 bucks dozen.  But then I’d have to sell my sons on the idea of Massasoit, spending the best years of their lives in Brockton instead of South Bend.  I’m slowly coming to the realization that the ship is sailed on me, and trying to turn them into the golfer I’ll never be.

I’m selling them on the dream.  How being a great golfer wins you respect. How winning your friends money feels like triple real money.  How great golfers ride a gravy train with biscuit wheels.  How their whole life is glory and the envy of others and eating $100 steaks off some flight attendants butt in the back seat of your Cadillac Escalade.

I’d give my right arm for that.