The Golf Gypsy: Letter to Dad

Dear Dad,

I wish you could be here to see the changes in golf in the last thirty years.  You'd be so impressed by the young women who can hit the ball 275+ off the tee, and they might be only fifteen years old!  Even my driver distance improved with the new technology in golf clubs and golf balls. When I was fifty-five I could still hit the ball farther than I did at eighteen.  I've kept my old persimmon MacGregor woods as a reminder of the beauty and difficulty of times past, but the heavy leather bags that tore at my shoulders have long since been given away.

This summer while playing in the WOGA Stroke Play Amateur at Dornick Hills, one of your old favorites,  I saw an old woman playing golf.  She swung the club exactly like you might have taught her, a smooth rhythmical swing that looks effortless, but judging from the distance I watched the ball fly, she hit the ball at least 10-30 yards less than a younger women.  This old woman played the cliff hole like an aging tree, moving stiffly in the wind. I felt the cracks of her spine that reflected the rugged cliff facing her.

Her 8 iron could no longer carry the cliff, her eyes seemed to have tears in them, but her resolve moved her stubbornly to the next shot and the next until her ball found its way to the top and onto the green.  Only then did I realize that I was that old woman, not someone I could point to and say, "When I'm that old I'll ...."

I sobbed silently that day, but kept my head steady and putted with skill and focus to make up for the lost yardage.

Dad, you've been on my mind constantly this summer because I remember with love and sorrow how difficult it was for me to watch you age.  Now I am understanding your pain daily when I get out of bed or play golf.  I watched how your burned and scared arms from that childhood fire stiffened your wrists causing you to cringe with every golf shot or hammer stroke. I noticed when your hips refused to rotate how the pain shot down your legs causing you to explain the "hitch in the get along", but you never stopped playing golf, Dad.  Sometimes weeks passed between rounds of golf.  You slowed down, took longer naps. Most importantly, you persevered and taught your two daughters by example.  Thank you, Dad

The Golf Gypsy, Letty

The Golf Gypsy: Full Circle

Golf a four letter word.

A few weeks ago my friend, Leah Jackson, and I went out for dinner.  There in her car was a large lavender marble painted gift sack stuffed with colorful tissue paper. Before we pulled out of the drive way Leah said, "This is a Susi Gift for you." Where upon she added, "Open it now before we leave."  

I queried her about a Susi gift, and she said, "It is an old Southern tradition.  Simply a gift for a friend..."

With happy hands and a smiling face I carefully pulled out the colorful papers to find this photo framed and staring at me.  I laughed, "Golly, Leah my parents used to have a picture like this hanging in the den.  I haven't seen it in years, but I love it.  Where ever did you find it?"  

With sparkles in her eyes she said, "Turn it over."  There on the back of the wooden framed picture were my father's words and my mother's words, in their handwriting, and dated.  Before I could speak I cried, and even cry now with tears of happiness as I relate this tale.  

A gift returned forty years later.

In dad's handwriting it reads, Oct. 1975.
In mother's handwriting it reads, 

                                           12/21/75
To Jack and Norma ___
      The number one couple of the Miami Country Club.  
      May the worst thing in your lives be a single bogey.

  Johnie and Helen Stapp


Leah married Scotty Jackson, son of Doc and Norma Lou Jackson from Miami, Oklahoma.  As the years passed we attended the funerals for Norma Lou, Doc, and many of our Miami friends. Then nearly two years ago Scott Jackson died, leaving Leah and her two children.  We moved back to Norman shortly after Scott's death, and Leah and I have become dear friends.  Leah and Scott cherished this photo after his parents died, and now Leah has given the photo back.

We both cried and hugged that evening before we even left for dinner.  It's not often life blesses you with friends like Leah and the Jackson family.  

The old cherished picture has a new place in our home, right where we can see it every day after a game of golf, after running errands, after spending time with family and friends; it is there to greet us, and remind us to laugh.  

May the worst thing in your lives be a single bogey, dear friends.  

The Golf Gypsy, Letty