Musings of a Golf Newbie - Golf & Love: A Lot Alike

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By Jordan Farr

The other day I went out with friends; two couples, and a golf buddy of mine.

We discussed lots of things, but there were a couple of topics I found particularly interesting, one was "love and marriage", and the other about "love and golf"!

It occurred to me that... in certain ways... the two seemed a lot alike. The relationship one has with a spouse... or a significant other... and the relationship one has with the game, actually have numerous points in common: There are good days and bad, days that intensify the love and days that make you feel like you’re stuck in a Whistling Straits sandtrap... without a sand wedge.

Sometimes the game seems to perfectly fit your personality and your interest level, a match made in Golf Heaven. However, you can also find yourself going through a rough patch with golf, where you don’t even want to talk about the it, let alone play the game. Increasingly, you may find your time together fraught with frustration. You fondly remember the past, and the way things once were. The honeymoon... you decide... is clearly over.

And just then, something happens that charms you; a putt you're sure you messed-up meanders towards the hole and... responding to an invisible break... drops right into the center of the cup. Or you make a subtle change during a routine session at the range and suddenly you're hitting the long, pure drives of your dreams... one after another. So there you are with golf, right back where you started, in love again.

Yes, golf is a lot like love. In fact the biggest difference my friends and I could find was that after a bad round, you can go to the 19th hole and get a beer and a meal, while a fight with a spouse most often leads to eating leftovers and sleeping on the couch.