TEEING OFF AT TWILIGHT

There’s an ophthalmologist at my club who plays alone early in the morning, when the course is empty and there’s barely enough light to make out the top line of an eye chart. He’s a beginner, and he doesn’t like to whiff in public. I felt the same way when I was starting out, almost 20 years ago. In those days, my friend Jim tried to make me less self-conscious by assuring me that no golfer ever cared about how any other golfer played. Nevertheless, that first year I preferred to keep my bad shots confidential, between me and the rising sun, the way the ophthalmologist does now. There’s something comforting, too, about teeing off when it’s still so dark that not even you can clearly observe the magnitude of your inadequacy. Nowadays, I’m a lot less likely to miss the ball completely, but I still like to play early, when there’s a chance of spotting the headlights on the superintendent’s golf cart. I like playing at the other end of the day, too. On a golf trip a couple of years ago, the second nine of our second 18 became a race between us and the setting sun, which had already touched the tree line when we made the turn. By the time we reached the final tee, we couldn’t see the red tees from the whites, yet somehow we were all able to sense the trajectories of our drives, and we didn’t lose a ball. All four of us played pretty well, too, because when you’re in a hurry you don’t have time for self-defeating swing thoughts. The best golf days are the ones that stretch from dark to dark—from first light to last—and I’ve had some of those, too. One of the best was at Pinehurst six or seven years ago, when Tony and I felt insufficiently golfed after 36 holes with the boys. While everyone else went back to watch TV and kill time until dinner, we grabbed a cart and played a third 18. The guys in the cart barn had to wait for us in the dark, like parents after a high school dance. When we finished, there was nothing left to do but eat and go to bed, so that we could wake up early and do it all again.