To golfing, with love

I've taken to gold, it hasn't taken to me

I’ve taken to golf. It started off more as a whim. Anybody who was somebody was playing it. Or if not playing it, speaking about it. Moreover, the lush green expanse called to me even though the environmentalist in me baulked at the water required to maintain it. What started as a whim, however, grew to be a desperate desire to actually play the game. I’ve taken to golf. Which is all very well, except for one damning truth. Golf hasn’t taken to me.

Every so often, I rearrange my schedule and make my way hopefully to the golf course. And, without fail, each time, the hope turns to despair. Always an articulate man, Winston Churchill said, “Golf is a game whose aim is to hit a very small ball into an ever-smaller hole, with weapons singularly ill-designed for the purpose”. Truer words were not spoken. I was a bad golfer except when it came to actually hitting the ball. At first, the excuses had tripped out – the distant blaring of the horn skewed my otherwise perfect drive. The flap of the bird’s wings on the other side of the green at a crucial moment distracted me from my putt. Eventually, I reached the inevitable conclusion. I couldn’t play the game.

In the midst of this despair is my golf coach. A colossus standing tall in the midst of my ruinous game. Each time I make a grievous drive, he smiles encouragingly and reminds me that while my shot was terrible, my backswing was perfect. Every time I miss a putt, he kindly tells me that the slope of the green at that particular hole was known to be treacherous and to trip up even the most expert of players. And when I can’t get out of a bunker and tell him miserably that I’d rather curl up in the sand and die, he pats my back encouragingly and reminds me sagely that golf is much like life. We have to play the ball where it lies.

He is the very epitome of patience and kindness. Never a harsh word for not following his instructions, never a rebuke for repeating the same mistakes, never impatience with my inability to get it right. I am aware how I lose my temper with my own daughter when I teach her school work, so his patience with a rank outsider amazes me.

PG Wodehouse said “To find a man’s true character, play golf with him”. I would like to stretch that further. To know a real gentleman, meet with my golf teacher.