"Be still, son!"
Lovett and I went to the Regions Charity Classic golf tournament at Ross Bridge Resort today.
Neither of us know that much about golf. My company is one of the sponsors and we get free tickets every year and I hate to waste free tickets.
Formerly, the tournament was the Bruno's Memorial Classic at Greystone Golf and Country Club, an intimate course with people's backyards bordering the cart path. The Ross Bridge course is huge. I used to like walking the entire Greystone course, but I gave up at Ross Bridge. Maybe I'm getting old or something.
A couple of funny things happened to us. First, we were standing in the shade to the left of the fifteenth fairway. It was a perfect spot. Picture a long, thin pond across the fairway, the fifteenth hole a couple of hundred yards to the right, the fifteenth tee a couple of hundred yards to the left on the side of a high hill. Across the thin pond to the right is the fourteenth tee, and to the left the fourteenth hole. A good to-fer, something that wasn't possible at Greystone.
We watched a couple of threesomes play the two holes. Then up steps Mike Sullivan, who whacks his tee shot, which not surprisingly, I lost. I commented to Lovett, "I hope that thing doesn't come up here." As soon as I stopped talking I heard a whistle over my head and a plop in the woods behind me. We turned and not twenty feet behind us lay the ball on the other side of the cart path. Sullivan hit another tee shot but when he saw that the ball wasn't very far in the woods he played it. (Apparently you can do this. Not knowing golf I'm not sure about the rule. He bogeyed the hole, I know that.)
Then, we walked around to thirteen and arrived as a threesome was on the green. Thirteen's hole is high above the cart path. From the path I could see the golfers only from the waist up. As the marshal signaled for silence, I stopped in the path, but Lovett kept walking up the slope towards the ropes. It was too late for me to stop him. Jim Dent was addressing the ball ("Hello, ball!") when suddenly he stood upright. He's 6'3'', so when he stands up, you notice. The three caddies turn to Lovett and yell, "Be still, son!" Lovett stopped dead in his tracks, Dent bent back over the ball, missed the putt, and then knocked it in.
We got some pretty good mileage out of that one, believe me. It was "be still, son" this and "be still, son" that the rest of the day. Lovett's attitude was, "It's just a game, what's the big deal?" until I kidded him that he probably cost Jim Dent $100,000. Then, I looked at the scorecard after we got home and saw that Dent is tied for 38th and that he birdied the hole. So Lovett only cost him an eagle. Is that bad?
We walked around some more and one of the marshals heading off duty handed Lovett the "quiet paddle" that he raises to quiet the crowd. Except here in Alabama the paddles say "Hush Y'all" (isn't that cute?).
Lovett raised it high the rest of the afternoon, anytime he suspected that someone was about to break a rule. Funny man (the man in the picture is not Lovett, though he may be funny, too).
Last night, Lovett and I were eating a late supper at Krystal when somehow the discussion got around to CS Lewis and JRR Tolkien and which one introduced the other to Christianity and how Lewis loved allegory but Tolkien didn't and how they read their work to one another. This has nothing to do with golf but I just wonder how many men were privileged to have a conversation like that with their thirteen-year-old sons last night?
Neither of us know that much about golf. My company is one of the sponsors and we get free tickets every year and I hate to waste free tickets.
Formerly, the tournament was the Bruno's Memorial Classic at Greystone Golf and Country Club, an intimate course with people's backyards bordering the cart path. The Ross Bridge course is huge. I used to like walking the entire Greystone course, but I gave up at Ross Bridge. Maybe I'm getting old or something.
A couple of funny things happened to us. First, we were standing in the shade to the left of the fifteenth fairway. It was a perfect spot. Picture a long, thin pond across the fairway, the fifteenth hole a couple of hundred yards to the right, the fifteenth tee a couple of hundred yards to the left on the side of a high hill. Across the thin pond to the right is the fourteenth tee, and to the left the fourteenth hole. A good to-fer, something that wasn't possible at Greystone.
We watched a couple of threesomes play the two holes. Then up steps Mike Sullivan, who whacks his tee shot, which not surprisingly, I lost. I commented to Lovett, "I hope that thing doesn't come up here." As soon as I stopped talking I heard a whistle over my head and a plop in the woods behind me. We turned and not twenty feet behind us lay the ball on the other side of the cart path. Sullivan hit another tee shot but when he saw that the ball wasn't very far in the woods he played it. (Apparently you can do this. Not knowing golf I'm not sure about the rule. He bogeyed the hole, I know that.)
Then, we walked around to thirteen and arrived as a threesome was on the green. Thirteen's hole is high above the cart path. From the path I could see the golfers only from the waist up. As the marshal signaled for silence, I stopped in the path, but Lovett kept walking up the slope towards the ropes. It was too late for me to stop him. Jim Dent was addressing the ball ("Hello, ball!") when suddenly he stood upright. He's 6'3'', so when he stands up, you notice. The three caddies turn to Lovett and yell, "Be still, son!" Lovett stopped dead in his tracks, Dent bent back over the ball, missed the putt, and then knocked it in.
We got some pretty good mileage out of that one, believe me. It was "be still, son" this and "be still, son" that the rest of the day. Lovett's attitude was, "It's just a game, what's the big deal?" until I kidded him that he probably cost Jim Dent $100,000. Then, I looked at the scorecard after we got home and saw that Dent is tied for 38th and that he birdied the hole. So Lovett only cost him an eagle. Is that bad?
We walked around some more and one of the marshals heading off duty handed Lovett the "quiet paddle" that he raises to quiet the crowd. Except here in Alabama the paddles say "Hush Y'all" (isn't that cute?).
Lovett raised it high the rest of the afternoon, anytime he suspected that someone was about to break a rule. Funny man (the man in the picture is not Lovett, though he may be funny, too).Last night, Lovett and I were eating a late supper at Krystal when somehow the discussion got around to CS Lewis and JRR Tolkien and which one introduced the other to Christianity and how Lewis loved allegory but Tolkien didn't and how they read their work to one another. This has nothing to do with golf but I just wonder how many men were privileged to have a conversation like that with their thirteen-year-old sons last night?
posted by Chris @ 11:04 PM
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