How You Look At Success

From the 10th tee box of our course you can easily see the practice green. Over the past two years there has been a quantum leap in the number of four foot golfers with chopped down putters. It is refreshing and amusing to see these kids either gleefully wailing away with the putter skidding the ball 30 feet into an elderly Asian guy who doesn't see the humor, or scrunched over a 3 foot putt with faces screwed up in concentration like only a kid can do. If they sink one, by accident or skill, they turn on an expression of achievement and a 10,000 watt smile.

That's the four and five year olds. By the time they hit the ripe old age of six, showing that kind of uninhibited joy just isn't cool. What's cool is to do the golfer stud walk over to the hole, pick up your ball, casually drop it back on the green and putt it again. Aint no big thang. Inside I know that kid is screaming YES!

And that brings me to Heather. She's the cute gal in the photo. Heather and her boyfriend (now fiance) Jeff joined our group about two years ago. Jeff is a pretty competitive golfer (until he screwed up his rotator cup) and Heather was just learning how to play.

This past Saturday Heather shot a 65, her best ever. Now understand we play at Westchester in Los Angeles which is an executive course with 15 holes and a par round is 52. This may sound like a miniature golf course to some of you but the greens are sweet and the ocean "breeze" makes it pretty sporty.

So the thirty something Heather is standing on a picnic table bench doing that little dance you do and it is obvious that she is not suffering from the same inhibitions of the six year old mentioned above. She breaks out into a "I beat Geoff by 9 strokes" chant repeating it over and over with enthusiasm. Geoff is the "Commissioner" of our group, and if the truth be told, beating him by 9 strokes aint no big thang. Out of 23 golfers that played the round, 21 beat Geoff by a combined average of 15 strokes.

However, it put a big grin on my face to see an adult demonstrating the same exuberance as a five year old. It made me feel good just seeing it and I wondered why can't we, as adults, be that open all the time.

Coincidentally, I also shot my personal best round that day, a 2 over 54.
I however, did not dance on the bench chanting I beat Geoff by 20 strokes. No, I was regretting the missed birdie and the scuffed par putt that would have put me at my goal of even par. Why is that I wonder? Is it the glass half full or half empty syndrome? I don't think so. I think that Heather blasted past her expectations and I didn't quite get to mine.

And then there's Geoff who shot a 74. He was just happy that he beat Tom.