Tuesday, June 27, 2006

Golf’s appeal?

Yesterday r. e. wolf gave me his view on the game of golf:

“Hit the little ball.
Go find the little ball.
Hit it again.
Keep finding, keep hitting.
Eventually knock it into a little hole in the ground. Then what?

“Hit it some more.
Chase it some more.”

Well... yeah.

But first you have to HIT it. That can be challenging—at least, for some of us. I mean, swinging at the ball is easy, but hitting it can be another story entirely.

Even the pros whiff it occasionally. Well, okay, VERY occasionally. But they do!

And then, as r. e. says, you have to go FIND the little ball. Now THAT can be REALLY challenging!

But enough of the negative, let’s talk about the positive aspects of the game. When you DO hit the ball, and hit it well, it just SOARS up and up, rising above all the trees (and some birds), and then falls lightly down to roll across the grass. Hopefully in the general direction you had in mind when you swung at it.

Carol is fond of saying that she was hooked on golf from the first time she made solid contact with the ball and watched it take off and fly. THAT was FUN!

Now I, on the other hand, am still waiting for that experience, personally. But it sure LOOKS like fun, when I see others do it. So I’m sure it WILL be fun if when I ever do it.

But you know; a lot of people bad-mouth golf as a dumb game that consists of chasing a little white ball around. From that perspective, let’s look at some other sports.

How about bowling? You toss this big, heavy ball and let it roll down a hardwood lane towards a bunch of wooden pins. You either hit them or you don’t. The ball comes back, and you roll it again. Big whoop!

Tennis? You swat a ball with a racket. If it clears the net, somebody swats it back. Then you swat it at them, and so on. Again, big whoop!

Basketball? You run back and forth between two “goals” and try to throw the ball into one of them while keeping the other team from throwing the same ball into the other one. If either team succeeds, they toss the ball to the other team and let THEM try. BOOOORR-ing.

And the list, as they say, goes on and on.

At least in golf you can walk around outdoors in the fresh air. You can listen to the birds sing, watch the deer and the antelope play, and listen for “discouraging words” that come floating on the breeze from other golfers (and turn the air blue).

Some will never understand the enjoyment others can get from experiences like that.

But then, I’ll never understand how people like r. e. wolf can create works of art like he does.

9 comments:

Unknown said...

*THUNDEROUS applause*

Thank you for THE best response I have ever gotten to the whole "golf" phenomena.

Signed,
The Guy Who Couldn't Write His Way Out Of A Paper Bag Never Mind Hit That Little Ball

Anonymous said...

I am the spawn of golfers. And married to one. And mother to two. They surround my every waking moment.

But I still say Twain - was it Twain? - said it best:

Golf is a good walk spoiled.

Duke_of_Earle said...

Jen,

Yes, it was Twain. But he also wrote that the reports of his death were greatly exaggerated. And he DID die. So what does HE know?

HA!

John

Karyn Lyndon said...

Golf is a great activity for someone with money and time to burn. My husband and son played last weekend for 5 hours and between the green and cart fee and beer maid it cost $80.

Time alone in my new office to write...priceless.

Anonymous said...

What about baseball? Two teams - one who is in (batting) and one who is out (in the field). The team who is out wants to come in so they try to get the team that is in, out. When all the batsmen are out, they come in and the team that was out in the field then goes in until they go out. Big whoop.

Anonymous said...

Duke, what I don't get about golf though is why do you need a course to play it ?

I go walking lots, I recently walked about 70 miles round the Yorkshire dales. I actually like going to the driving range. It would liven up the walk if I took a club and a bag of say 100 balls and hit them as I walked.

it would save me on green fees but maybe I would lose a few more golf balls.

Duke_of_Earle said...

Karyn,

BEER maid? NOW we're talking!

Rob,

That sounds to me like a GREAT idea. My problem is that between the bulls and the rattlesnakes in the ranch pastures (not to mention the rocks that can do serious damage to a driver... or an iron, for that matter...) it's tough here in Texas to just walk around "the dales" and hit golf balls.

Michelle,

Yes, I thought about baseball, and football (both American and world), and other "sports." Like I said about the list...

John

Monica said...

I like golf. I love basketball. I love football. I LOVE RANGERS BASEBALL.

But yeah, I like golf.

Anonymous said...

I never could get into the game of golf. I was taught to play when I was in highschool.. i wasnt too bad at it but I just could never get into it..

OH! And about the big C.. I think you are right!! I really do..
My drawer in my kitchen broke yesterday. Hubby went to get a fork out of it and the dang thing just came out and dropped everything on the floor. The rails it runs on.. broke! And its not goign to be easily fixed as its hard to get to in the cabinet to fix it.. I pretty much broke down over the silly drawer.. It was just the 3rd thing to break!