Good Lies

 

Good Lies

 

Nick feared he’d collapse waiting. Hitting a little ball with a club seemed impossible. He knew the old men behind him assumed that he, barely 13, would play poorly and hold them back. They’d see him as a nuisance, and he’d embarrass his grandfather.

“Does he give you a run for your money?” one of them asked grandfather, and smiled at Nick. “He’s good,” grandfather replied. Nick lowered his head, dismayed that expectations were raised.

It was a cool June morning with sparse, fluffy clouds. Nick looked forward to his Friday nine holes with grandfather. He practiced his swing in the yard through the week, imagining hitting soaring drives with people watching. He counted the days till his next round, wishing for sun.

Grandfather hit first, his swing quick and controlled, smacking the ball 210 yards. Nick struggled to balance the ball on the tee. As he started his backswing, he felt his weight shift too far right. To achieve a solid strike, he’d have to shift left with unfathomable precision on the way down. When the bottom of his metal driver grazed the top of the ball, he knew he’d failed. He winced in disgust and shame at the ball rolling through the dewy grass, stopping 30 yards away.

“Have a good game, son. No rush,” said one of the men. Nick grimaced and nodded. He hit his second shot in haste. It was decent, landing a bit ahead of grandfather’s drive. They walked in silence with their clubs jingling in the bags on their backs.

His nerves settling, Nick wanted to talk. “Golf must have changed a lot since you started playing,” he said. “I suppose,” grandfather replied, as he eyed the ground’s undulations. He brushed the ball forward with his putter. It missed the hole by the width of a comb. Nick watched, realizing he’d implied that grandfather was old.

They walked to the next tee and waited for a foursome to get off the green. Nick enjoyed being irritated by waiting. He watched the players behind. They’d all hit their shots into the woods and were searching. Nick liked that too. “I wonder what golf will be like 500 years from now,” he said. “I’ve seen pictures of people in the 1920s using hickory-shafted clubs and wearing ties. Golf balls were made of feathers.” The men left the green. Grandfather’s swing struck the ground too early, resulting in the ball landing short. Nick hit a wayward shot into a sand trap left of the green.

“Courses are in better shape now,” grandfather said as they scaled a hill. “There’s less luck involved.” He chipped the ball low and rolled it to about three feet from the cup. Nick took two shots to get out of the bunker, quelling an urge to swear.

They walked through the woods. Mist rose from the ground as the sun speared the canopy. The smell reminded Nick of the family’s cottage in western Pennsylvania, surrounded by hemlock pines. He remembered a warm night there years ago, when he and grandfather talked about the mysteries of outer space, like what could be at the end of it and the heights of mountains on other planets.

The broken asphalt of the cart path became weedy dirt at the tee box. Nick liked this hole. Its wide fairway curving right suited his natural shot shape. He swung his driver hard, hitting a high fade down the middle.

“Great drive,” grandfather said, then hit his ball a few feet past Nick’s. “Can golf improve forever,” Nick asked, “or would it change into something else, and how do you know when something changes but stays the same thing, or when it changes into a new thing?” Grandfather nodded at the ground. “Good question,” he said. Nick ventured, “People think death is scary, but the opposite might be worse. Imagine knowing you’d live forever as who you are now.” 

Grandfather cleared his throat. “You wouldn’t be motivated to do much,” he said. “You’d know you had all the time in the world.” A fat gray-bearded man drove a mower across their path. He raised two fingers on the steering wheel and nodded to them. “Old Hobey,” grandfather said. “He’s been here a long time.” The engine’s diesel whine receded.

Nick continued, “With death, we can imagine someday being something else. Without it, we’re the same forever.” Waiting at another tee, he worried he’d said something offensive, and was relieved when grandfather asked, “When would you stop aging, if you never died?” 

Grandfather hit his drive right and too high. He exhaled in disgust as he picked his tee out of the ground. “Couldn’t a person grow and develop forever?” Nick asked. “People get tired,” grandfather said. “Bodies wear out, and ideas get hold of their minds. Some things can’t be fixed.” They walked past a short path into the forest leading to a heap of grass clippings, black at the bottom where the blades had been decomposing for months, melding into each other. The smell made Nick think of cutting the yard at home, pushing the mower up hills in the summer heat, and the crisp green lines in the lawn after he finished. 

He followed his good drive with a topped 5-iron and an ill-struck pitch. Grandfather missed a 9-inch putt for bogey. They walked off the green in silence. The sun heated the air. They waited again, standing under a towering maple tree with numerous initials carved into its knotted trunk. A bench underneath it had a plaque on its highest rail saying “In Memory of Harry, 1916-2005.”

“Is the self an idea?” Nick asked. He popped up his drive into the trees to the right. Grandfather hit the ball on the heel of the club, a low and meager shot into the left rough. They drifted apart, reconvening at the green’s apron after enduring struggles with poor swings, thick grass, and trees. “Golf is just a game,” grandfather said, eyeing his bogey putt.

Bill Sanders

 

Bio: Bill Sanders  is a software engineer and freelance writer, most recently published in Sublation Magazine. In his free time, he reads, plays golf, and visits at least two countries, new to him, each year.