This is where it all began for me and this game I so truly love. By finding balls with a friend along the left side of hole 10 when I was 8 and then hitting them back onto the driving range with a club I'd borrowed from my friends mother. I wasn't a member at first and the owners wife, a Greek lady, who spoke funny English I thought, was mad at us, even looking for balls in the woods\brush wasn't to popular. I remember telling my father about her and suddenly we were members and I started picking balls for the Head Pro Scott Nash instead. I can remember his first attempt to help me with my game, he just wandered over to me one day while I was digging into the dirt and showed me how to hold the club correctly - man that was a weird feeling I remember thinking, how am I going to hit the ball now? Well, it didn't take more than a few swings and I stopped digging and started playing...
I never thought I'd come this far actually. I was a hoopster, a basketball player really- that was my first love in sports but there was something about that little white ball that I couldn't get enough of during the summer. I'd even skulk on the basketball practicing many times and walk up to the club and spend hours just playing, chipping and putting. Bugging Mr. Nash in his shop and always asking for tips about this funny but addictive game. He always, well, almost always just smiled and had something positive to say, I'm sure sometimes he'd had enough of all the questions I'd have and was to busy but I never really saw him get mad or be cross with me or anyone for that matter. He was a popular guy and a good teacher. Putting was his nemesis, at least that's what he said and occasionally I'd see him practicing those 3 to 8 footers and I'd see the frustration mount- I understood then how important it was to learn to roll the ball well and I'd copy his drills. Being a good putter is like having a secret weapon and is the difference between winning or losing. I learned that from him and I am forever grateful.
Spending hours and hours this winter on it - more than I ever have really and of course I'm hoping the accumulative time will pay dividends this season. One has to be, have hope and belief in oneself to stand there for hour upon hour doing 'the fools work' in a sense. Doing the exact same thing over and over, thousand upon thousands of times and just have faith that it will all pay off in the end. Taking it seriously but playing the game in your mind and seeing the results without putting to much pressure on yourself. Letting it go and being kinda of like a fool in heart. One will never know unless one tries, to give yourself a fools chance of making it but believing in yourself at the same time, the god given talent one has, the eye hand coordination just given at birth and work like a crazy person in search of this fool's life. Maybe in the end it'll be not..not a fool's life but a winner at this game, this funny game that mirrors life in so many ways and maybe just maybe it will all pan out as one can see it in the fool's eye's.
Most of the courses are opening here in the far north where I live and it's going to be fun, to get out there and play. Remembering each time where I actually come from, Rock Creek Country Club and represent them with pride each and every time. Thinking back to the fool's life of a child who dared to dream big about basketball but ended up seeing that the best game is not the big round ball but the little white one. It's never to late to start, to dream like a fool would, without doubt or self judgement and just go for it. Live the fool's life...
A special shout out to Mr. DaSilva, Director of Golf and everyone else at Rock Creek Country Club!!
