"This Thing Of Ours"

When I was a young teenager, the hardest part about playing golf was not hitting fairways and greens. It was getting the opportunity to do so in the first place. I had a few friends who like myself, owned a set of hand-me down clubs. We were inner city kids without drivers licenses, so getting back and forth to the course was our biggest obstacle. We relied on our parents who now and then would take mercy on our plight and offer us round trip transportation to one of the local municipal courses. We were generously handed a few dollars for greens fees and on good days, spare change for a hot dog and soda at the turn.

Life was good. With visions of Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus dancing in our heads, we played the game with a passion. We understood the rules, observed the etiquette, and seldom held up play. Still, we received little respect from the majority of older golfers we met and played with during these too few far and in between rounds.

We watched groups of guys playing in skins games, walking to the first tee with confident swaggers and gamely trash talking their opponents. We looked in their bags, salivating at the shiny new equipment they carried and hoping someday we too would swing such sticks. We wanted to be like them, to grow up and enjoy the game the way adults do, to have groups of friends who enjoyed competition and met regularly to engage in spirited battle on the links. These men were like golfing gods to us, and we paid them their respect due, but unfortunately, it was rarely returned in kind.

Now and then, one of these older players would join my friends and I for a practice round. It was obvious most times that the senior player was less than happy to have to do a loop with three kids carrying rag tag bags and less than polished swings. The older player usually kept to himself, making little conversation and acting irritated as if we were somehow responsible when one of his shots were astray. It was far from the truth. We were young, but smart enough to know that we had much to learn about the game and the best way to gain that knowledge was to watch and play with experienced players. We longed for that day when we could be one of them, invited and welcomed into their skins games. When that day came, we knew we were real golfers. Until then, we were outsiders in the midst of our rites of passage to the game's hierarchy.

Those days are long gone. Somewhere back in time, we got game. I'm not sure if there

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