Golf and Equality

          My golf league had its last gathering of the year yesterday.  Ours is nothing fancy, just a city league full of the retired nurses, teachers, and other professions you’d find in a group of women past a certain age. It give us a chance to get outdoors and chat a little. I know it was a godsend to me during Covid since a sport that can penalize you for touching your opponent’s equipment is perfect when you’re dodging personal contact.

          This morning, though, it occurred to me that in spite of its image as a sport for the wealthy, it can also be a place of egalitarianism, where age or status mean little.  

There’s nothing more humbling after a successful career, smug in your past accomplishments, than to take up golf. There are three tiers of proficiency in our league, based on handicaps. I imagine you can guess which group I’m in.

          Besides the professional women, there are those who have stayed home for forty or more years, raising children and then caring for grandchildren, with no big career to look back on.

There are some members who very likely have to budget carefully to justify the weekly $18 needed to walk nine holes. But these same women are respected for their explosive tee shots that sail yards beyond anyone else’s.

          Among those being recognized yesterday for the best scores of the season were Nancy, a tiny woman of 88 who many of us watched nervously as she slowly made her way to the restroom, but who won in the second division. It may take her a while to get from the golf cart to the tee, but once there, her drives are long and true. Every time.

          The top winner of the year was Alice, with the build of a strong midwestern farm wife, the stride of someone twenty years younger, and the humility of a real champion. She just celebrated birthday number 90.