Golf Fore the Good

I picked up a phone call from one of my favorite clients the other day. The first words out of his mouth had nothing to do with business. “Guess what I did today?” he quizzed me. I was so far off base with what I was going to say, I was glad he blurted out the answer before I could get my own words out. “I teed off at Augusta National at eight this morning!” Uh-huh… I would have been a little excited to tell someone, myself.

“The greens were like lightning,” my client said. Ya-huh, I’ll bet, I thought – and they probably hadn’t even been cut that morning, the Monday after the completion of the Master’s golf tournament. Somehow, even considering I might three putt my way around those treacherous greens, this didn’t make me feel much better about the fact that he had played the course and I hadn’t.

Just a year ago, I had trod the hallowed fairways of Augusta myself. OK, not so much trod as ambled around aimlessly, slightly overcome by my surroundings, slack jawed and in awe. A complimentary badge for a single afternoon at the Master’s had come into my possession, and I had thoroughly enjoyed my brief but memorable visit to the National. But a tee time? An actual tee time? Playing eighteen holes at Augusta National is surely something most of us can only fantasize about.

I am pretty sure no amount of who-you-know, what-you-know, pulling of strings or high profile connections will ever get me on the tee at Augusta. But a girl sure can dream, can’t she?

There is dreaming in the “it might happen someday, if all the planets align properly” way. Then there is dreaming as in the “it is definitely never going to happen, and I can’t help but still think about it anyway” kind of way. I consider myself an optimist , but I’m pretty sure my dreams about teeing off at Augusta National fall into the second category. Considering that a) even all the money in the world won’t buy me a membership at Augusta because of the happenstance that I was born a female; b) I don’t have all the money in the world; and c) I am quite sure I will never fall into the “wives and guests” category that would allow me to tee off despite my sex, my tee time isn’t anywhere in sight.

About the sex thing – Augusta wouldn’t be the first time I suffered golf-related sex discrimination. They sure do have issues down there in the south. I am still fuming - and my brother is still laughing – about the time I was refused entry to the men’s grill room at his exclusive Atlanta golf club. The situation involved much more than the fact that I wasn’t allowed in the bar; it was my reaction to the same that was more memorable. This Yankee girl had never been up against those kind of rules before, and I was smoking mad. Up north I belly up to the bar all the time, just another one of the guys, and don’t think twice about it. Apparently those aforementioned “wives and guests” enjoy a different set of privileges than do I. They might score a tee time but hanging with the men requires a separate invitation.

Would a round at Augusta end in the same scenario? Would I be denied a cocktail with the guys and be relegated instead to lunch in the garden room, all prim and proper? There is no doubt I would miss the end of round camaraderie that a couple of drinks with friends in a good bar provides. But who am I kidding; I’d be happy to drink from the garden hose if I could play just once around that magnificent course. Oh, sure, they’d love that at Augusta, wouldn’t they?