Tiger he ain't

I've always thought golf was a stupid game. In prep school, one of my roommates was captain of the golf team, and we razzed him unmercifully for going out in his cute golf outfits to chase a little ball around a course, while us "macho" guys were trying to knock each other silly on the football field.

Turns out, of course, he was a lot smarter than we were. A couple of years ago I was going up a chairlift with two Colby friends, one of whom I played football with, the other a fellow track team member. We decided that, had we been smart, we would have skied and learned to play tennis and golf when we were young.

It's a cliche of course, but obviously sports that you can play throughout most of your life are by far the most valuable, and they're easiest to learn when you're young. I confess to not having played a second of organized football, run in a track meet, or played anything other than pick-up hockey in the forty years since I left school.

Immediately after graduation, I hit upon tennis as the ideal long-time sport: fun, competitive, social and somewhat aerobic. I went to week-long tennis clinics for three consecutive summers not long after I left college and mastered the basics. So for the next 25 years or so, tennis was my major athletic focus.

But two artificial hips and a chronic bad back finally persuaded me to give that up, leaving me with - of all things - golf. And I admit, mostly cart golf. The reasons I can't play tennis mean that even walking 18 holes is pretty tough for me. But I have discovered, late, the joys of golf: the satisfaction of making good contact, the thrill of making an occasional good shot, the ease with which mulligans and foot wedges can improve a score. There's also the sociability, the outdoors, and the 19th hole.

I hit a few balls today for the first time since the surgery, and was pleased to discover it didn't add to my pain. I hope it won't be long before I am out there hacking up my home course again.

I also gave Janice her first lesson today, the day after we picked up a set of lefty women's clubs used for $26. Can't beat Play it Again sports! Me teaching her golf is a bit like the blind leading the blind, but it was fun anyway.