Bunker, pg 2
The courses are invariably naturally arid deserts that have been transformed by unconscionable amounts of water into lovely verdant landscapes. But the game itself interferes somewhat with my desire to commune with nature and celebrate our cosmic one-ness.
I do find raking the bunker to have a certain Zen-like therapeutic effect. The actual game is, of course, impossible. As it turns out, golf clubs, unlike golf bags, are not the least bit user-friendly. The mere notion that one could, while standing upright, strike a tiny sphere on the ground with a long, skinny pole is laughable. To assume it can be done with accuracy and power is downright demented. No offense to those virtuous golfers who walk the course carrying their bags, but I'm guessing that the sport is not high on the endorphin index, either. Yes, if it weren't for the actual playing of the game, this definitely would be the perfect sport.
Despite my own lack of proficiency, gender is not much of a disadvantage in golf. A slow, careful swing and good equipment can approximate the same result that large biceps and sheer power provide. No, oddly enough, the male advantage in golf is not physical. It's mathematical. They've developed these goofy betting games that definitely favor the left-sided brain. I think I can master 'skins,' but I need a laptop for 'bingo, bango, bongo' — the name of which I always found mildly lewd. And when someone suggests "multiple presses or greenies, birdies and sandies on a Nassau," I just fling him my wallet and tell him to take whatever he wants.
As with so many things, my true forte turns out to be not in the substance, but in the appurtenant. I am a downright savant in aprés-golf. The clubhouse ritual of a cold beer and a fat-laden snack come naturally to me. I was recently spotted spreading mud on my pant cuffs and scribbling on a score card, before hoisting my clubs out of my trunk and heading directly from the parking lot to the clubhouse bar, where I set up shop with a pile of my business cards directly in front of me and waited for hapless business opportunities to walk by.
One negative (aside from the unsightly little ankle-level tan line) is the unparalleled world of gag gifts that playing golf invites. I had barely hung up the phone from scheduling my first lesson when my daughter presented me with a collector's plate of a fantasy fairway featuring a waterfall, butte, ocean and alligator-infested moat. I didn't get the joke. That's how most fairways actually look to me. It was followed closely by a club-handed watch, a "I'd Rather Be Golfing" license plate frame, and a "Golfers Do it With Follow-Through" bumper sticker. I wondered where, in this classy sport, the market for such kitsch is . . . until I saw an electric coffee-mug-warming-coaster that doubles as an indoor putting cup and screams "fore" whenever you touch it. Those pink, personalized tees have got to go, though.
So far, my athleto-business plan has been met with astonishingly limited success. Golf has provided me with an activity with which to entertain clients, a venue for meeting colleagues, and a conversational topic common to many of my professional peers. It has also introduced me to contacts and friendships that seemed woefully inaccessible because of my gender. As it turns out, however, the entire benefit of such contacts is instantly eliminated whenever I explain that I would not consider keeping score, and life is just too short to hit out of a bunker.
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
|
||||||
