I Take a Mistress: Golf
Hello, and welcome to the fifty-second installment of NotWriting.com, an open journal on how one writer spends his time when he really should be writing.
A month ago, exhausted from the 14-month hell of getting an agent, I had no interest whatsoever in writing anything new, and editing the second book in my detective series was a chore. After so much ambivalence towards my work, and so much outright rejection, I was overwhelmed by feelings like, "Why bother?" and "Nobody cares."
My soul was damaged, and I needed something to repair it. Something fun and social, yet meditative. An activity that would get me outside, enjoying the summer for a change—instead of being imprisoned in my office, typing. I needed an activity I could channel my single-mindedness into, but it couldn't be frustrating. I gave it a lot of thought....
So I took up golf.
Back in college, I had played golf about 10 times, but that was over 15 years ago. Besides, I never learned the right way of doing things. This time—now that I was older and wiser—things were going to be different.
I Get the Call
The way golf cast her spell on me began innocently enough: a phone call from my brother-in-law. Dennis Mahoney is an avid golfer who plays in a league and shoots in the mid-80s.
"Hey," he said, "wanna play golf tomorrow?"
"What time?" I asked.
"Six."
"AM?"
"Yeah."
I thought about this. Although used to getting up at dawn, I wasn't sure I wanted to be wielding a 5-iron that early—my slices were liable to kill somebody.
"Alright," I said, "as long as you don't mind me putting every other ball in the woods."
"No problem. I've got the Slazengers you gave me for my birthday."
"So, if we have to be there at six," I said, "when should I pick you up?"
"Five-fifteen."
There were a few seconds of dead silence.
"We wanna get there early," Dennis said.
"Yeah."
And so we went.
Now, if I had shot, say, a 120 that first morning, the game probably wouldn't have enchanted me very much. But after 15 years of dormancy, I went out and shot a 108. My brother-in-law called me a "natural" (I think my sister told him that's one of my favorite movies). He said I played better than some people he knew who had been doing it for 20 years.
"Seriously?" I said.
"Seriously," he said.
I was hooked. Some wise man called golf the "rich man's crack," and the way I checked out every golf book from the library, dropped about $100 at the driving range in the first week, and punted three old men in the balls to tee off first, I have to to agree.
I Break 100
A week ago, Dennis called to tell me he shot an 80. I was thrilled for him.
If you play golf, you get what I'm talking about. If you don't, let me try to explain.
Golf courses each have a "par" or a set number of shots it should take you to get through the course. Most 18-hole courses have a par of between 68 and 72, and the object is to complete the course in the fewest number of shots.
Along the way, golfers have milestones. Every golfer who completes courses in 108 wants to break 100, guys who shoot in the 90s want to reach 89, and so on.
So, when Dennis, a guy who my his own admission has been shooting in the 90s for the past year, finally reached 80, I was really happy for him. And when I shot a 98 yesterday (after only a month of play), I was ecstatic.
I was hooked. Some wise man called golf the "rich man's crack," and the way I checked out every golf book from the library, dropped about $100 at the driving range in the first week, and punted three old men in the balls to tee off first, I have to to agree.
You see, for guy golfers, reaching each of these milestones is the equivalent of going to bed with a hotter and hotter woman. Like my fictional detective, Dakota Stevens, I love redheads, so my milestone list would look like this:
Orcutt's Golf Milestones List with Redhead Equivalents
100 (which I just broke): Isla Fisher
90 (which I intend to reach by September): Julianne Moore
80 (sometime in the next couple of years): Angie Everhart
70 (the possibly unattainable): Ann Margaret
For those of you who prefer visuals, here's a page of pictures of my golf milestones and their redhead equivalents.
Well, I'm off to the golf course now. Vassar College, where my wife, Alexas, works, has a nice little 9-hole course, and I want to get a round in before I pick her up from work.
NotWriting & Golf—like chocolate and peanut butter. I can't think of a more enjoyable procrastinating activity.
If you're a writer looking for an escape from the drudgery of writing, I heartily recommend it. And if you're not a writer, I still recommend it.
