Chasing the Flag
Playing a game that cannot be won
by
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Golf
It has been a very difficult thing to put into words what golf means to me. And while words can describe the feelings and emotions of an experience, I truly believe, to experience golf or attempt to understand why people will spend their last dime to play this game, is similar to asking a why gambler will put their last dollar down on "red 3" and hope for the best.
Is golf an addiction? For some, it could be the case. If the intoxication of fresh air, the smell of lilacs in spring as the scent travels across the 8th green, and the caress of the wind as it blows across your face as you line up a ten foot putt is an addiction, then I suppose it is.
Golf is such a great game because what other past time is there where you can call a penalty on yourself, and the competition is between you and the course. Some will try to tell you that you are competing against the other players in your group or tournament, but this is not the case. You and the course, amno amno.
More importantly, golf is a game of decisions. It is a game of choices. It is a microcosm of life in general, leaving nothing behind but the memory of what could have been or what was, but most certainly what could be again. You do not try and hit the ball back at someone or catch it; you try and hit the ball to a location dictated by no one but you and your abilities to make it happen.
Golf mirrors life in that it provides us opportunities to excel and then it wants to see us react to the tragedies that occur along the way. Golf affords us the opportunity to look at what we have become, and better yet, what we can become.
Golf gives us the joy of relationships, both on and off the course, affording us the opportunity grow spiritually as well as physically. To feel the impact of the perfect swing, to know that for once you have been able to create the perfect shot as it falls next to the pin or better yet goes in for an eagle. To experience the rush of accomplishment as the 40-foot putt snakes its way into the cup for a birdie, to be able to write down a score and circle it on the scorecard, is the ultimate experience that very few can say they have accomplished.
Golf gives no quarter and takes no quarter. You earn what you get. Just as in life we learn to achieve your success through accomplishment when you put in the time and effort, but the end result is something that is difficult to explain but undeniably the greatest feeling there is.
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About the Book
It has always been a mystery why non-golfers cannot understand what the great attraction of this game is and why so many people try and play a game that cannot be won. In the few pages of this book the author attempts to explain why he continues to return to a game that both frustrates and infuriates one moment and the next, offers a euphoria that results in memories to be cherished for years. The game of golf is made up of assorted sticks and balls, carried or pulled around a course that is somewhere in the neighborhood of three miles long, but is played by people. It is the experiences these people bring to the course that make the game so memorable for everyone that plays the game. People and places make up this great game and it means something different to each individual. This book is an attempt to explain what the game means and has meant to the author.
About the Author
Steve Dick is an avid golfer for 35 years who has experienced the joy and frustration of the game through three college degrees, two marriages and three children. He is a business professional that has enjoyed the game of golf, in both its recreational and business development forms, as it was intended to be played, and as it has evolved through the years. Learning the game with little or no instruction, the game became a passion that evolved into written form in an attempt to explain the unusual attraction of a game that has been described as both frustrating and a fantastic emotional ride.