Earlier this week, I wrote about my enduring love for summertime in my hometown. When I lived here back in my twenties, one of my favorite things about summertime was the fact that the golf courses in Tucson got pretty quiet, especially in the afternoons. I used to golf a lot, and I wasn't going to let a UV Index of "Death" keep me away from a course that only had a few other heat-loving yahoos like me on it.
I was never a particularly good golfer. Most of the time, the game would make me question all of my life choices. At least once every round, however, there would be one shot that made me feel like I just won the Masters.
That's all it took to bring me back for more.
My love for golf never diminished, but some real life circumstances conspired to make me hit the "Pause" button on my golfing days. The first was travel-related. I used to bring my clubs with me on the road. That stopped when airlines began charging for extra bags, then all luggage. Unfortunately, most of my golf was played when I was traveling, which I hadn't paid much attention to until the luggage charge thing.
Like everything else in Los Angeles, golf isn't cheap there. Even the few municipal courses there make you feel like you're joining a country club. Once I became a divorced dad, there was a time problem. Eventually, I just stopped.
Tucson is a great city for duffers. We have fantastic, affordable municipal courses, as well as beautiful resort courses that seem like a bargain when compared to anything in Los Angeles. I've been back for several years, but didn't start thinking about golf a lot again until last year. There is no woman in my life at the moment, and I think I miss having a built-in source of aggravation. I know that golf will happily step in and handle that for me.
True, there might be a woman in my life if I didn't view the ladies as a source of aggravation, and I promise to bring that up should I ever go back to therapy. Then again, there also might be a woman in my life if I had golf to carry the aggravation load. Perhaps I should revise my requirements for a dream woman to include "Understands that golf is keeping us from killing each other."
In the course of one short, rambling column, I've convinced myself that I need to spend a lot of money (clubs ain't cheap) to start golfing again so that I can one day soon be in a healthy relationship. It would appear that I don't need a return to therapy. I'll just head to the first tee and wait for the romance magic to happen.
I am now a living, breathing Lifetime movie. That's real growth.
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