Golf Story

I grew up near a 9 hole municipal golf course that was built, in part, as a recreational facility for the steel workers just outside of Levittown.



The course is affectionately referred to as ‘ the goat path’ and it lives up to it’s billing. It floods on a regular basis, the tees are just the regular grass cut a little shorter, and the fairways and the rough are indistinguishable except that the fairways seem to actually have grass in among the weeds. Perhaps the most troubling thing about the course at this time this story is told, is that a mild winter had encouraged a flock of Canadian snow geese to stop their migration and as we moved well into the summer the bird just never left. Between the feathers and the turds, the course was turning into the bottom of a parakeet cage.



Despite its limitations, for years the course has been the source of fun and camaraderie for people of the community and a great learning ground for youth players many of whom have gone on to play golf in college, or as is the case with my brother, onto the professional ranks.



About 10 years or so ago, a bunch of the regular players decided that the club should have a championship. They agreed upon a format and set at date. At my parent’s, that date was circled with a big red market and written in the box was “ the Club Championship”.



My Mom had taken on a part time job at the course and for my father, this was heaven. You see my father is a golfing addict, and my Mom had then become his dealer. Free golf from dawn till disk and my Dad took advantage of every opportunity. Dad had become obsessed and if beating the goat path had turned my father into Lancelot then this tournament was to be his Holy Grail.



For day after day that summer he toiled out in the open sun honing his game. He learned the nuance of every green on the course, he had yardage and club selection down pat, and in case of emergency he become one of the few, if not only, people to learn how to hit out of the hard packed dirt that occupied the bunkers.



Finally the tournament day came. Actually the tournament was to be held over two weekends. In the first weekend the golfers were to play two rounds (18 holes), then the top 8 scores would qualify for the finals. The finals would be the following weekend and were set up in brackets like the NCAA pool everyone got a seeding according their scores and 1 played 8 and 2 played 7 etc etc in 9 hole match play competition ….Until the final two players would contest a final 18 hole round head-to-head to determine the champion.



After the first day, things went as planned. My dad won the medal play and was seeded in first place. The other eight were an assortment of local blue collar regulars as well as an unknown outsider, James Woo who was seeded 4th. My Dad cruised through both and second round matches….the man was on fire. He was tee to green perfect and all the putting practice had paid off. The first match was over by the 6th hole when he was 4 up with 3 to play. And the second contestant made it 7 before going down 3 and 2. In an act that was more hopeful optimist than hubris a small area was cleared above the TV stand that night, and Dad went to bed on Saturday with only Mr. Woo and 18 holes of match play between him and the Cup.

The final match was epic. The two men chased each other all over the goat path matching each other stroke for stroke. Dad went up one with a great putt on 3 only to have Woo get back even on the next hole with a birdie. Back and forth it went and the tention of the game grew as did the size of the gallery of locals following the match.

After 18 hard fought holes to two men found themselves tied.

It was getting to be the end of the day and the sun was just beginning to settle and the air beginning to cool. The two men took a brief break at the clubhouse for a soda and a trip to the bathroom and then they headed out. It was agreed that they would go back out to the first hole and then play a sudden death format. The first player to win a hole would be declared champion.

By this time, most of the other groups had finished thier play for the day and lined up along the first tee to watch the playoff. The crowd was obviously partisan. When Mr. Woo hit his drive there was barely a murmur. My Dad lined up, and his tee shot down the middle of the fairway was met with thundreous applause. It seemed that the " you-da-mans!" were going to be reserved for the hometown guy.

1st hole - both players in the fairway...both on the green...and two putt pars put them off to hole number two.

As had been the case all day long, the tee shots on the 20th hole had both players within yards of each other, both in the fairway....neither conceeding a thing to their opponent. However, the second shot finally saw the pressure of the situation cause a small crack in the armor. Mr. Woo hit a shot that landed short, checked up and trickled onto the very edge of the green. It was on the dance floor but as far away from the hole as you could be. Instead of taking advantage of the mistep, Dad had a lapse of concentration and pulled the ball leaving it 30 yards right of the green.

The gallery formed around my father's ball with a reverent silence. Men who hadn't prayed in years quietly chanted in their heads..." please God, the trophy has to stay here at the club. I promise that I'll cut back on the drinkin' and blaspheming...just don't let the Chinaman take our Cup away."

Oblivious to the crowd, the world around him, and even to the geese running around freaked out by all comotion, my father stepped over his ball with the focused concentation of a spinal surgeon. He laid the face of his loft wedge open and made a big slow arching backswing. At the very top of the swing it seemed as if the whole world paused for the briefest of moments along with his club and then TWWWAACCCCKKKKKKK ...he came down across the ball sending it in a high arching orbit into the pinkish dusk sky and onto the green....... 2 inches from the hole.

The crowd went nuts.

Mr. Woo conceeded the putt and was going to need to make the hole in two putts in order to force another playoff hole. My dad went from danger to the driver seat in one miraculous shot. He trotted up to the green retrieved his ball and ran back to the group with a series of high fives and atta-boys as Mr. Woo stepped walked to his ball.

Mr. Woo was rattled. He grimaced and stepped over his putt nervously knowing that he had to get it close. The fluid putting style that he had shown all day was gone he took a stabbing jab at the ball that was too hard and obviously too wide and the ball careened off the putter at a queer angle. A sea of poorly hidden smiles broke out across the gallery as they tracked the ball now flying across the green.

Then the unthinkable happened.

As was customarily necessary at the goat-path, Mr. Woo had cleared a path of the goose dropping and feathers from his putting path. The gave him a clean line at the hole. His ball, however, was no longer heading toward the hole and therefore no longer on that cleared path.

The ball, which was on a path to end up a long 10 feet left and another 10 feet past its mark suddenly hit the biggest, fattest goose turd on the course. On making contact with the bird poo the ball hopped a foot in the air. The ball checked up, slowing down considerably, and ( skid mark and all) jutted back to the right. You could hear the collective gasp as the ball returned to the putting surface. It rolled another 4 feet, hesitated, and then disappeared into the hole for ( appropriately enough) a birdie...and the win.


Respectfully, if quietly, Mr. Woo was presented with his trophy at the clubhouse in a small ceremony. He loaded his stuff into his Honda and drove off into the evening with the Champions Cup and a satisfied smile. My Dad never let the situation break his spirit and I've never heard him complain about his bad fortune...that's not his style. He congratulated his opponent, moved on, and he's continued to improve his game shotting in the low 80's and into the 70's on a regular basis. But despite his stoic extrior, I sense there's exists a small spot on his heart, as spot just about the same size as the small area still cleared on the mantle above the TV stand.