The 15th Hole

I have to warn you guys, this is a long post. I started going on a tangent one night when I was writing and just decided to go with it. So if you want to throw in a load of laundry or something, now is the time.

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I’m currently participating in a kickball league.

No, really. I’m serious. I’m on a team named “Awkward Mornings,” and every Tuesday night we battle another group of misfits in a game that combines 3 great sports: soccer, baseball, and dodge-ball. I mean what could be better than that?

It’s a fun game until you drop a fly ball and feel slightly retarded for doing so. I mean the ball is bigger than a basketball. It’s not moving very fast…and yet…you drop it.

But, it is because of reasons such as this that the REAL match is played at a local bar about 45 minutes later, where a heated game of flip cup seems to establish the overall winners of the evening.

After all the pitchers, shots with the bartenders (well I mean…shit…THEY bought), yelling over Journey to talk about how cool our team name is and a few hours of mingling with the other teams, I pass out on my friend’s couch and awake a few hours later to head back to my apartment for a shower before work.

I honestly don’t know what some of these players do for a living where they can go out and drink HEAVILY every night of the week. Wednesday mornings suck enough for me the way it is right now, let alone trying it every night of the week and shortening my life span by about 3 years. There’s a time and place for all that. And it just so happens that place is Florida. I’ll “delve” into that little topic soon enough.

Anyway, Wednesday’s are a lot of fun for me. And, because I normally come into work pumped up and act completely insane most of the time, it’s very easy for people to tell how crazy I got the night before. Uber geeks watching porn make more noise than I do after a rough night of sipping soda with the rest of my jovial cohorts.

“Tom, are you ‘hurtin’’?”

That’s our little code word around the yard for “hung-over.”

“A little.”

“Well suit up. Got a loop waitin’ for ya.”

“What’s the members’ name?”

Pause.

“Have you been with Mr. Fun yet?”

“No. Nice guy?”

“He’s an asshole.”

Awesome.

Mr. Fun was a rather rotund hairball with legs. He walked like he had a golf ball lodged in his rectum (probably from one of his own errant tee shots) and he sounded like Louie Anderson. He had three guests: Mr. Normal-Face, The Ambassador, and Mr. Perfy. Mr. Normal-Face looked as though he had been drinking since he was a fetus. His glowing red face must’ve been very popular back in college at those ever so popular “Rudolph-the-red-nosed-reindeer-dress-up” parties. Then there was “The Ambassador.” I never learned his real name because that was the only name by which he wanted to be called. Guess he wanted to hang onto those golden years way back when where abusing diplomatic immunity was the “in” thing to do. He refused to learn my name (I have a name tag), which is fine because it is quite complex to pronounce (only one syllable). Instead, he simply called me “Caddie” the whole round.

“Caddie! Where does this break?”

“Breaks right. About two cups.”

Next hole.

“Hey Ambassador, nice shot. I just need to get a couple of clubs from the cart here and I’ll go up and admire that life-changing 3-wood you just hit from 119 yards out.”

“Get the cart?? Ha! The CADDIE will do that for us! Won’t you Caddie?”

Wait. I’m sorry. What was your name again? Douchebag? Oh wait. That’s right. “The Ambassador.” I must’ve mispronounced the “A” when I said “Douchebag” just then. My bad.

The last player in the group I named after David Pelz’s putting dummy, “Perfy.” Perfy is flawless on the greens given the right line and speed. No muscles or ego to block the way. Just metal and gravity. Perfy had 22 putts all day. And nobody seemed to care but me. I was in AWE of this DEMI-GOD of a man.

During the round, Mr. Fun had this quirky habit of wanting the yardage from EVERYWHERE. Normally, I wouldn’t have a problem with this because I feel that the more yardages I give out, the more meaningful my position. But this squealing hairball of a man NEVER hit the ball anywhere NEAR his target or the yardage given. You remember TC Chen, right? That guy in the Masters who lost because he double-chipped his ball on 15 (I think that was the hole)? I saw Mr. Fun do that 3 times today. And two of them were full swings. On 13, he hit his ball again on the upswing and skulled it 20 yards back over his head. If he had been choking up on the club there was a good chance it would’ve hit him directly in the face.

But the 15th hole says it all.

All four teed off. Two went left and two went right. I decided that it was in my best interest (as far as the tip was concerned) to follow Mr. Fun and make sure his stay on hole 15 was a pleasant one. Well he was one of the balls that went right. Short right. Technically, his dick should’ve been hanging out. But I mean hey, today was a day of sportsmanship, not technicalities.

He whiffs his second shot. He’s 345 yards away, and he wants a yardage. So I give it to him.

“Well then. I guess I better lay up.”

Shanks his third into the woods.

He is now 284 yards from the front, but that doesn’t matter because he has no shot. He has to pitch it out laterally.

“How far to the front?”

I tell him.

“Well, are you going to just stand there? Or are you actually going to do your job and give me a line at the green?”

I stand in the middle of the woods amongst a plethora of angry squirrels. I beg them all for forgiveness. He knows not what he does. He’s just a blind brother of yours looking for a nut to chew on.

He shanks his fourth deeper into the woods.

“Well now. This isn’t fun. How far do I have now?”

I give him a look that seems to ask the question, “Does it really matter you steaming pile of Yak feces?”

“What? I want to know.”

“224 to the front.” At this point I’m making up yardages.

“AND? Where should I aim?”

I stand against a tree, erring on the side of a lateral movement toward the fairway.

He absolutely kills his fifth shot, which bounces around the trees like pinball before finally coming to rest in a big-ass bush.

“Where did it go?”

But I didn’t see. And the reason—which I forgot to mention—is that the other player in his cart is in a similar situation and I was busy hacking his ball out from under a different bush.

“I didn’t see.”

“Why not? Isn’t that your job?”

“My face was in this bush looking for your partners’ ball.”

“So what? Where’s my ball?”

Were you ever loved as a child? Or did your parents simply abandon you because you’re so freakin’ IRRESISTABLE?

SOMEHOW I find his ball in a nearby bush. He takes an unplayable, and now he’s hitting 7. Wouldn’t you know it, he whiffs his 7th shot and the ball comes to rest down in some exposed roots of a tree in between the SAME BUSHES. Meanwhile, his playing partner is laughing hysterically.

He takes another drop (because he’s worried about breaking his wrists, although with his club-head speed I have to wonder if he even displaces any AIR MOLECULES), and proceeds to chunk a 3-wood straight up into some branches, where it rattles around and bounces behind us.

He shot me a look to see if I thought any of this was funny. I could’ve won the World Series of Poker with the stare I gave him. I was expressionless. We must’ve stared at each other for at least a minute before he regained his composure and decided to try again. He was breathing hard at this point and the heat was slowing him down. He was now hitting 9, about 220 from the flagstick.

Somehow, he hit a miraculous low-hook out from all of the trees and skipped it into a fairway bunker. About 75 yards remain.

If Bigfoot had a younger brother, and if that younger brother happened to drive a Taxi cab around downtown Manhattan, that would have to be what I saw emerge from the forest that day. He valiantly approached his bunker shot after he gave me another Shooter-McGavin-esque look and he skulled his 10th shot into the lip of the bunker. The ball rolled back to his feet.

“GOD DAMN MY HAIRINESS!” He screamed to the heavens.

He pauses, full of hope and ground beef, and hits an awesome 11th shot. He sticks it to 20 feet and leaves me with half a bunker to rake because he walked all over it looking for a sandcastle to kick over.

He picks up his ball and tosses it in my direction.

“I’ve had enough of this hole.”

What? Oh come ON man! You’ve got to be kidding me! I have to know how this ends. Are you going to sink it? 3-putt? What?

But we will never know. We can hypothesize, though. My own personal opinion is that while he addressed his putt the heavens opened up, a little smurf-like creature descended upon the green, pulled out a lighter, and blew a big gassy fireball in Mr. Fun’s direction. Mr. Fun is then TURNED ON by what he interprets as some sort of mating ritual, and sinks his putt for a legitimate 12.

Granted, I have no PROOF of this. It’s just a gut feeling, really.

And I can always tell that a bad tip is coming even before I take the money out of my pocket to look. If the money is rolled up really tight in the form of a doobie or some sort of origami cube, you’re not lookin’ too good. Mine was of the doobie persuasion.