THE GOLF SEASON

Opunake Times, 28 February 1933, Page 3

THE GOLF SEASON

SOON TO COMMENCE. GIIEENS LOOKING WELL. In about a month’s time local golfing enthusiasts will be getting their bags in order for the new season which promises to be a good one. The scheme inaugurated at the close of last season, whereby members undertook to care for greens allotted to them has worked wonders and enlarged, level areas will serve to improve play this year. Several of the greens have been greatly enlarged-, the grass top-dressed and bad portions tilled in. This will assist a good deal in putting, many a match being lost by uneven greens in past seasons. The following article will no doubt interest the average golfer. It is true to life.

Golf is a good game, as long as you are satisfied with the game of golf you play. Free from the cares of the office, clad in bloomers and a sweater like a. sunset, the golfer potters about over pleasant pastures, magically combining leisure with exercise, competition with aesthetic appreciation. The ideal golfer, if he hits his ball into a hedge, is grateful to gods who have thus called to his attention the green wonder of boxthorn; if his ball trickles down a gully, he delights in the quiet sheep and the greener grass in the hollow; if his cup pf tea at the club house tastes vaguely of tar and distinctly of kerosene, he thinks that is an additional joy in the picnic; if he slips down the hill coming home, he remembers that ever since he was twelve he has regretted that his dignity would not permit him the ecstacy of rolling down a grassy slope: if it rains, it is pleasantly cool: if it is 99 in the shade, it is comfortably warm.

In fact, for this golfer, the game is paradise. The only trouble is that no such golfer exists.

If the real - alter goes round in 74, he is annoyed because he missed that putt at the thirteenth, and so missed bis 74: and when, as I do, he goes round in 130 or so, he loses his humanity entirely, When the tea tastes of tar he has a fit; when he slips down the bill, he bites pieces out of his mashie, and when he reaches home he goes to the garden and buffets the lettuces and throws stones at the ducks.

If only one could play golf without trying to be a golfer, the game would be perfect; but as it it, tbe only ideal'golf is played in front of tbe bedroom mirror.

You stand there; you think how beautiful your plusfours are. looking; you bend one knee and waggle your hips suggestively. Lite becomes all golden and you take a club and swing it blissfully to your own silent applause. Then you knock a vase from the mantlepiece. Xo, golf is a wicked game. It means nothing but weariness of body and anguish of spirit . There is always a two-foot putt you have missed: you always would have qualified but for that slow player in front who put you off your game. There is no doubt about it; no one should ever nlav golf, for a golfer’s humanity becomes all rusty. And that reminds me, I must put some oil on my clubs this afternoon.