100 HOLES OF GOLF

MPC @ First Tee - Southeast Wisconsin's 100 Holes of Golf Fundraiser - Hansen Park 9/13/20     "Par for 2020"

Like a lot of other things going on in 2020, our first foray into the 100 Holes of Golf was hard to summarize in just one simple narrative.  

The conditions were not optimum…playing the familiar back ‘swamp’ nine, no carts, socks soaking wet after the first three holes, mud balls ‘plugging’ on every shot, and the realization that this thing was going to take a good 10 hours if we were really going to play 100 holes.  Besides this, the front nine was literally chock full, and this during a Packers game!  

But, dear friends, things also turned out, well….momentous.

It started to turn after the turn, when I suggested to Wolf that we play two balls a hole (count each score as a ‘hole’) to speed things up, maybe get done in seven hours as opposed to 11.  This gave us Hope. (To be honest, while it coincided with the rules and we received the blessing of both the president of the league and the host sponsor, I have wondered if we missed out. More on this later.) 

Despite my contemplative reflection of the ‘shortcut’, or maybe a continuation of it, I came to another conclusion.  Due to David Cohn reserving the back nine at Hansen for just the First Tee fundraiser, the Wolf and I occupied an entire half of a golf course, for just the two of us.  And while at the time it seemed a little selfish, it actually turned out to be totally awesome. 

Two men, walking through puddles, chasing a little white ball for 100 holes has an allure to it.  Something monumental.  Something neither of us had ever done. Fueled by the mist and low clouds flowing around the trees, river, and small hills and probably the several miles we had already walked, four hours into our round it seemed we were the only humans left on the planet, apart from a hallucinogenic vision of a man running through the course who occasionally played through but never spoke a word. (If you don’t believe us, just ask us) Wolf kept meticulous score, counting our strokes and our dots on the four scorecards he kept tucked in his pocket. 

Neither of us were certain if it was saving grace, welcome distraction, or disorienting distraction when we saw the welcome smiling faces of our brethren and our sources of motivation at noon who joined us for an hour and a half, updating us on the Packer game, providing needed nourishment, and Bloody Mary’s.  And while every hole was still serious…there were dots on the line, there were holes to be played, there was a cause to serve, and donors to be accountable to; the spell had been broken. The Wolf and I were back to the Real (Covid) World. No more mist, no more running man, no more solitude. It had to happen – “the return”, but there was something special about our first 3 rounds of that back nine – we were in The Zone.  The excitement of friends joining us was both exalting and draining.  There was a life outside of this day of golf.  I think the both of us didn’t really mind living in that bubble of just golf; focus on the hole and hit the stupid little ball.  It was simple. 

So did we make the 100 holes?  I’m not quite sure.  We played 100 scores.  I beat the Wolf by the incredibly close score of 339 to 344. We could have kept playing after we hit our quota and I am certain we will do whatever it takes, whatever conditions prevail, through wind or rain and snow to play a proper 100 holes next year.  I have a really cool plaque to place on my desk at work, but I do feel inside that we could have done more.  But that’s not the point.  The point was having all of you supporting us to make a difference for the 1st Tee of Southeast Wisconsin.  The point was raising money to support a cause that is close to our hearts.  We know and trust that was the source of your motivation to support us in this effort.  Being the only two on the course made for an internal struggle on how 100 holes should be played, but I know we will do better next year.  And we hope to see you out there! 

Michael "Holy Chip" Smith