fairwaywords

I loved lemon drops until the night I saw Darby O’Gill and the Little People. For those of you who weren’t around in 1959, Darby O’Gill was a reasonably popular Disney movie back then. I ate more than my fill of lemon drops at the movie and then horked all over the car as we drove home.

We learned the next day that the lemon drops weren’t entirely to blame—I spent the next week fighting a stomach virus—but the experience soured me on lemon drops for years. (If you’re wondering why I had some for the photo, my father in law loves them and my wife is paying him a visit later this week.)

Golf was getting to be like lemon drops for me last month. I’d eaten more than my fill of it and had horked all over the course, the scorecard, and my handicap. But just as with my post-Disney up-chucking, it wasn’t just a golf overdose that was the problem.

I’d fallen behind on a lot of little things around the house and property to the point that I found myself feeling hurried getting to the course and getting back. That haste was translating into a fast, choppy swing and impatience with bad shots. Of course, that only led to a faster swing and more bad shots. (Any parallels drawn between the tasks and my 1959 stomach virus are entirely the responsibility of the reader.)

So I’ve been taking a little vacation from golf. I’ve accomplished a lot around the house and property and generally messed around. I’m ready to hit the course again and I’m looking forward to the game as a game. I’m not thinking about how I can stop my downward slide and if I really should be playing instead of building cabinets, painting, or whatever.

Ronfucius just contacted me about being his partner at the opening match of the season, so the game is afoot. When the pros return to Kapalua I’m back on the course.

In an educational and ironic twist of fate, I faced exactly the situation I posted about in my last post. We held our club championship over the weekend and I started the final round 2 strokes out of the lead, tied with one of my foursome members. I figured both of us had a decent chance to overtake the leader, who was playing in a different foursome. Since my fellow competitor was the only person I could really keep track of during the round (no scoreboards, remember?) I just tracked my tournament progress against him. For simplicity, I’ll call him Bobby, because that’s his name. (A word of warning to readers: Serious golf nerdyness follows.)

 Bobby was on fire the first nine and couldn’t miss a putt, no matter the length. I was putting well, but my long ones were all lipping out or missing by tiny margins while his were falling. He made the turn 4 strokes ahead of me.

I gained a stroke on 10. When we stepped onto the 13^th tee I was 3 behind. The 13^th, as you may remember, is the par 5 I wrote about in the post.

 We both hit nice drives, with mine about 5 yards longer than Bobby’s. The green was marginally reachable for both of us, but with a back pin we were unlikely to get close in 2. We both pulled fairway metals from our bags. Bobby hit a low hook into the hazard. I stood in the fairway holding my club and arguing with myself.

Psychologists know that if you ask a person to monitor and record his or her behavior, the simple act of observation changes the behavior. The observation process also signals a commitment to engage in behavior change. For example, if a smoker is trying to quit and records each cigarette smoked, the number smoked will likely drop even before any behavior change program begins. My blog post was the equivalent of a smoker monitoring cigarette consumption.

Edited for brevity and family viewing, I stood in the 13^th fairway thinking: “Look, you idiot. You just wrote about this hole. You should lay up. Lay up! Listen to yourself, bozo!”

If I hadn’t blogged about this hole I wouldn’t have been nearly as convincing as I argued with myself. Stupid Charlie would have been likely to outwit smart(er) Charlie if smart(er) Charlie hadn’t written about the go for it vs. lay up choice. Stupid Charlie probably would have gone for it with a head full of churning uncertainty. I’ve seen him up close, and that’s how he is.

Instead, smart(er) Charlie won. I put down the fairway metal and pulled my 48-degree wedge. Firmly committed to a lay-up shot, I dinked a 100 yard wedge down the center. I followed this with a 7-iron to 5 feet and birdied the hole. Bobby bogeyed after losing his ball in the hazard, for a 2-stroke swing.

I managed a tie with Bobby by the 16^th tee. Unfortunately, I bogeyed 17 and fell 1 back. Bobby sank a 15-footer for par on 18 to win by 1. The other leaders had fallen away, so Bobby won and I took second. I guess I need to figure out how to write a blog post that will improve my game around the greens.

Bobby and I are now 1 and 1 in the big annual tournaments this year. Ronfucius and I beat Bobby and his partner in sudden death in our team tournament a few months earlier. (Coincidentally, I won the playoff with a birdie putt after a 7-iron close to the pin. I love that club.) We may not be Spieth and Day, but we have fun.

Turk discovers the photo shoot set

“Manage the screw-up quotient. That’s what life is. Deft management of the screw-up quotient.” (From Edisto Revisited by Padgett Powell)

Lately I haven’t been managing the screw-ups very well. I keep turning mid to upper 70’s rounds into low to mid 80’s rounds by having just enough bad holes to wreck my score. I can look back at each round and say, “Here, here, and here are exactly where I messed up.”

My home course is pretty intolerant of screw-ups. It’s possible to (and I have) hit it out of bounds off of every tee. Most of the fairways are relatively narrow and this is the windy time of the year. The lies are tight due to the long drought we’ve experienced and it’s easy to find yourself dealing with tree trouble even if you haven’t hit it far off line. But you can manage your way around the course if you pay attention and don’t compound your errors.

When I’m scoring well I avoid doubles by giving some thought to my tee shots and playing recovery shots for what they are – a chance to manage the screw-up quotient. When I’m not scoring well I just bang away off the tee and then whack away at improbable miracle recovery shots. After a few of these management errors I flail harder to try to make up for it and there goes the round.

I know things are slowly getting better because I can spot the individual shots that wrecked my score. When I’m playing poorly I just have a generalized sense of bad golf, not specific recollections of bad shots. If I could just manage the screw-up quotient a little better I’d have a chance to erase most of those doubles.

It also wouldn’t hurt if it would rain a little (at night, of course) and the wind would lie down.