Golf Column: My little heaven on earth

For the past few weeks, I seem to be watching sports full time, both in person and on TV. With the addition of the London Olympics to the regular lineup of televised sports, as well as local events, I had more to watch than hours in a day. This is when I decided that I really love sports.

My wife thought I finally had flipped when I brought home the bean bag toss game. You know, the one that is popular at tailgate parties, where you throw bean bags on a piece of wood with a hole in the middle. I don’t know if that is considered a sport but it sure gave me a couple of hours of fun.

As much as I love all sports, people who know me best realize that my true love is hitting that little white ball around the countryside. I fell in love with golf at the age of 13, when my family stopped giving me money and I had to caddy to make a buck. Sixty years later, I am reminded that I haven’t lost this deep love for the sport and how lucky I was to be able to make a living out of it all these years.

My love of the game was reinforced this past weekend when I crossed off time and traveled all the way to Gardiner’s Bay with nothing on my mind but championship golf matches. Watching local golf matches might sound boring to many, I know, but for someone who loves the game the beauty is in the thrill of competition. In a golf match, who you are, how much money you have or what you do in other parts of your life don’t matter. It is simply a matter of two people competing to see who is the best on that day.

Every golfer likes to watch long hitters and last Saturday I was in the mood to watch players bomb drives down the fairway. Wow, did I get what I came for! In the semi-final match of the club championship I got to watch four of the longest hitters in the club, 17-year-old Thomas Cassidy, 18-year-old Jake Card, 21-year-old Russell Holmes and 50-year-old Jay Card. Before you ask, yes the 50-year-old was just as long as the young bucks. My reward was watching 300 plus-yard drives on every hole.

One of my favorite things about golf is that it doesn’t need referees or umpires because you are trusted to call penalties on yourself. This brings me to one of my highlights of the weekend, which exemplifies what golf is all about. On Saturday, Jay Card was one up on Thomas Cassidy on the 15th hole. Things didn’t look good for Cassidy as he hit his second shot to the right of the par-5 15th green. He checked his ball (Titleist 3), which was nestled in a poor lie, and hit the shot out to within a couple of feet for the birdie.

But when Cassidy walked up to clean his ball, he discovered that this Titleist 3 did not have his own identification mark. Without hesitation, he called a penalty on himself for hitting a wrong ball. He lost the hole and went 2 down with only 3 holes to play. Seventeen years old and he already gets it.

Thomas won two of the last 3 holes and took the match to the third extra hole where he tried to end the match by driving the green. He missed this time and lost the match but in the future it will work and he will enjoy the thrill of it all.

So give me a beautiful golf course, friendly clubhouse and a group of golfers who understand the game and love to compete. This is truly my heaven on earth.