I love everything about golf. I love watching it. I love playing it. I love the excitement of preparing to go to a golf course to play a round. I love getting the bag out, cleaning the spikes, and packing the cooler - all are rituals that signify a long day on the links. I love the way golf shoes feel when walking from the parking lot to the club house. Strapping the clubs to the back of the golf cart, putting the glove on, rustling the tees in your pocket - all are rites one performs regardless of where one plays.
Every golfer knows that a round of golf has a feel that changes as you play the course. The first tee is daunting, and duffers know the fear that comes with the drive off the first tee box: just make contact and hit it down the middle...just...make...contact. The third hole feels different from the first two. At this point one is warmed up, and weekend warriors wish they could hit reset to erase the two double bogies on holes 1 and 2. The 5th hole is even more sobering. It is here that you realize you won't be playing anything near scratch golf today. This is the point where many stop keeping score. It is also the point when you take a deep breath and focus on why you are playing in the first place - to be with friends, and to escape the monotony of daily life. That feeling trumps all other disappointments that accompany a golf course.
Yes, I love golf, even considering my 18+ handicap. While watching the Masters I began to think about all the reasons I love the sport. Here are more things I love...
50 things I love about golf...
1. The way the grass smells different in the morning than in the afternoon.
2. The way a ball sounds rolling around in the golf cart.
3. The way a new glove feels when putting it on.
4. How the sun moves across the sky as you wind through the course.
5. How wonderful a 250 yard drive feels, and how consistently elusive it is.
6. How only 3% of golfers actually use the seed containers attached to the golf cart to cover their divots.
7. How a ball feels after a scrub in a ball washer.
8. How pulling out and putting back clubs in the bag is way harder than it should be.
9. How everyone has that 3 iron they can't hit well, yet still use it for 25% of their shots.
10. The sound the flag stick makes when dropped onto the green.
11. The beer chick and all her wonderful sundries.
12. How golf bags only have 2-3 pockets yet that tee or ball you need is always in the last place you look.
13. Hitting the sweet spot on a club so that the ball just jumps off the clubface.
14. Those puffy lies 10 yards off the green that allow a wedge to effortlessly lift the ball 70 degrees into the air and onto the green.
15. Getting a serendipitous bounce off a cart path.
16. The quiet desperation one feels looking for a lost ball while knowing a foursome looms behind.
17. Those right-to-left 20 foot putts that trace right to the middle of the hole.
18. How you don't truly believe you hit into the water until actually seeing the ball in the pond.
19. Cleaning the mud off the grooves of a wedge with a tee.
20. A blind sand save that collapses and dies two feet from the hole.
21. How the Vardon grip is ridiculous and perfect all at the same time.
22. The way a driver's shaft vibrates after tapping the bottom of the head on the ground.
23. How a tee can jump out of the ground after a drive and end up 5 feet behind you.
24. Hitting a 9 iron to a green that is 100 yards away and 20 feet above.
25. Hitting a bump-and-run too fast off the curtain of the green only to have it hit the middle of the flag stick and fall into the hole.
26. How one can drink 18 beers on the course and somehow still feel sober.
27. All the different shades of green that define a golf course.
28. How one can spend $150 at a golf course without noticing it while a $100 dinner tab makes one feel like they were punched in the stomach.
29. Hitting a 210 yard second shot with a fairway wood and rolling the ball onto the front of the green.
30. The way the ball sounds when rattling in the hole.
31. Fading a ball around a tree on a right dog leg onto the green.
32. How being stuck behind a slow group is much less stressful than being in front of a fast group.
33. Stopping to have lunch at the clubhouse before teeing off on the back nine.
34. How the roof of a golf cart offers absolutely no protection from getting wet when driving in the rain.
35. The inevitable awkward interchange between you and the foursome ahead after hitting into them without yelling "fore."
36. Hitting the pin after a smooth 7 iron shot.
37. Thinking you've lost a ball in the rough only to find that it squirted through and lies 20 yards ahead in the fairway.
38. How a 5 iron seems to be the perfectly balanced club for loft and distance.
39. Those perfect second shots out of the rough that save a chance at par.
40. How one birdie erases the memory of 100 double pars.
41. The way a soft green feels when walking across it.
42. The way a pitching wedge can make a ball bite beyond the hole only to slide back toward it.
43. When you have to choose between an 8 and a 9 iron - the longer iron being the correct alternative - and you know it and choose correctly.
44. Hooking a ball into the trees only to have it carom perpendicularly back to the center of the fairway.
45. The way the sun bakes one's arms and face toward the end of a round.
46. The slight melancholy that accompanies the final three holes.
47. Taking a few minutes to relax in the golf cart before the 18th tee.
48. Deciding to play another 9 holes before the sun goes down.
49. The quiet ride back home, when everyone is tired and content just to sit in silence.
50. The nineteenth hole.
