Farmers Weekly Review

Summer is kinda like New Year’s, except a lot less cold. At least for now.

As summer approaches, I make myself promises, ones I really intend to keep.

Every year, except maybe during the pandemic, I say I am going to play more golf this summer. I really enjoy it, especially now since I know I’m not good. I just like getting out with a friend or two, and seeing if I can overachieve, at least on one hole.

Or maybe just one shot, the one that always brings you back no matter how bad the round has been.

I have parred wicked Par 5s. I have birdied a good number (for me) of Par 3s. Hell, I came thisclose to a hole in one. Me. And I had my friend, Brent, with me.

I swung, the ball arched high in the air toward the hole (for a change), landed softly, and rolled ever so slowly toward the hole.

“Go in!” Brent yelled, as I tried to keep my heart beating. He is a much better golfer who often tolerates my dufferness. He’s had an eagle, but never a hole-in-one. He said he would have been thrilled if he got to see me get one.

That is a very good friend.

But, the ball curled around the hole a little more than a foot away.

“Go get the bird; I’ll run the cart up to the next hole,” Brent offered.

About that. My hands still were shaking from an event I would be able to recall into my dotage. Something blind, one-armed nuns have done, at least on the news.

And it was a tricky putt. A little uphill with that bend that took my ball for a walk around the hole. Yeah, I missed the bird, but I got the par. And a memory of a near miss and support from a good friend.

That friend has been missing from the links for a while, dealing with health issues. Until I wait for him to get back, I’ve had a few other partners, including former JJC President Judy Mitchell.

In this paper, you’ll see some pictures from the recent Young Farmers Golf Outing. But you won’t see one of Judy and me. Being that it was hotter than the hinges of Hades, as my late Dad used to say, we tried to shoot under trees as much as possible. As if we needed to try. Or at least me.

Not being farmers coated in Gold Bond who baled hay on days when the rest of us enjoyed Willis Carrier’s greatest invention, Judy and I called it a day after 11 holes, several bottles of water and slugs of Gatorade. Then a couple adult beverages in the clubhouse.

I hadn’t golfed in a year or so, and it looked like it. It wasn’t just missing Brent, it was, well, life, that kept me off the course and to the driving range only twice.

Work. Personal obligations. Heat. Rain.

Life.

Until a couple years ago, there was little more I enjoyed at the end of a nice day that sitting out on our patio, watching a fire burn in our chiminea. Listening to a ballgame, enjoying a beverage. Dusk to dark.

Funny thing. Once dusk is approaching, I don’t feel much like doing much except putting on my jammies and watching the glow of the television. Once a night owl; I now struggle to stay up until 10. And then up at 6 a.m.

I need to change my internal clock, stay up later and save some energy for a dusk-to-dark contained campfire.

And I will. Since we’re getting a new patio installed, I have time to practice. And I will.

That’s my late summer/fall resolution.

Maybe some more golf, too.

Really.