Golf Fore the Good

It has become a rite of spring, a sacred ritual that marks the start of a new season, a fresh beginning. After a year’s engagement, at the end of a long and tedious winter layoff, we join together in the company of friends and celebrate the start of a new tournament season at our local municipal golf course.

The two-person scramble my friend and I play each April is hardly a serious format. Still, we plan ahead from year to year and look forward to the day. We enjoy the tournament to such a degree that when I received an invitation to a friend’s wedding for the same date, I had conflicting emotions. Well, not really. I pretty much knew from the time I ripped open the envelope that golf would win out.

An emergency call to the groom was in order. “That’s a tournament date. What are you thinking? You can’t be serious?” I berated him. After all, does it really matter if you get married on a Tuesday, a Thursday or a Sunday? In the grand scheme of a successful marriage, surely it doesn’t matter where or when the ceremony takes place. Apparently, my friend’s wedding date was sited around family commitments. It’s one of those picayune details some people insist on, having family in attendance at a wedding. Any argument I made towards changing the date fell flat.

I’ve been to plenty of weddings - a good many of them were my own. The Spring Scramble comes just once a year. Tournament dates are set well in advance. I already had a commitment. What’s a girl to do?

The situation got a little trickier when I found out my husband was to be the best man at the wedding. Wouldn’t it be nice if I was in attendance, not just to share in the joy of the happy couple but to see my husband – just once – all dressed up instead of in a golf jersey and wind shirt? I might enjoy hearing him offer the toast to the bride and groom, well thought out and consisting of mature and respectful thoughts, instead of clinking a glass at the bar and muttering curse words about his golf game. As a side note, the bride didn’t trust him in the curse word department; she prepared a list of words that he must not include in the toast.

On the other side of the coin, would it actually change anything if I didn’t hear their vows exchanged? Would my friends be any less married if, while they were pledging their love to each other, I was wedging one up close to the pin on the fourth hole for birdie? If, while they were reciting their love and good fortune to have found each other, I was otherwise engaged with my own partner reading the line of a double breaking putt, how would that change their world?

It turned out to be a picture perfect day for a wedding. Darn good golf weather, too. I was only three hours late to the wedding – time enough to catch the bride and groom and offer my best wishes. I hope they laugh together, trust each other, and work as well together in life as my partner and I do on the golf course. If their union is half as successful as my alliance with my golf buddy, they’ve got a heck of a future ahead of them.