Iwicw

Everyone knows engineers can’t write! I is an engineeer! But...

I Wish I Could Write!

#####  Just a short history about me and golf.

I think the first time I played golf was in about 1963-64. I had come home on leave from the Air Force and one of my friends was caddying in the summer and took up golf. We played a new local course about a mile from my home. I don't remember much about it except it was not easy.

Several years later I was stationed at George AFB, Victorville CA and remember trying to take up the game. Again, it was not easy. For about the next 10 years I made other attempts to play the game, mainly when invited to play with someone who was into the game. Not being very athletic (maybe no athletic ability would be a better description!), I didn't get far. I remember trying to play at a course in Ubon RTAFB in Thailand during the Vietnam war. Not much more than a pitch and putt course - sand greens, tall weeds between green and tee, snakes, bugs, etc. It was also about a mile from the Laotian border.

When I attended Navigator training at Mather AFB, Sacramento Calif in 1973, my house bordered the golf course and I tried again - even bought a club - a Sam Sneed blue ridge 2 wood. Again, no joy but I knew sooner or later I would figure the thing out. Even got to play once with my paternal father, who I met for the first time about 10 years earlier. Played a few times at Langley AFB, Virginia (1974-75) and at McChord AFB, Washington (1975-79), but it was not until I was stationed at Gunter AFS, Montgomery Alabama (1980-84) that the bug hit.

I knew I was going to get out of the Air Force soon and needed to do something else other than work my ass off. I was invited to play in intramural golf as more or less a courtesy to the boss (me). They probably wished that they had not have invited me because I still was not very good.  I did get to see what being good was like and made up my mind that golf was going to be my hobby. That was in about 1983. I've been playing at the Cypress Tree Golf course on Maxwell AFB ever since.

Still have not achieved good - and probably never will, but a 12-15 handicap is livable.

Why will I never achieve <strong>good</strong>? Because a major motto that I live by is that you can always do something better. I don't think you can ever achieve perfection, you can just get better.

It's been almost two years since I retired, and as pointed out in The Money Pit posts, golf has had to take a back seat for a while. I've probably only played about once a month since retiring.  That is a lot different from someone who played twice a week for probably 48 weeks a year. I've played a few times in Gadsden, but hope to play a little more with at least some of the burden of having two homes to take care of off my mind.

2010-07-10-Saturday-and-no-golf

July 10, 2010 12:41