The Dimples of Despair

You awake full of optimism, it’s the Tuesday medal. The usual tee-off time of 12.02pm is booked, your regular partners are coming with you. Senior golf for the older chaps, in the final quarter of their lives It gives you time to watch a couple of YouTube videos, maybe take a swing tip out with you. Only one, you don’t want to overload your head. Check the weather app, mark a couple of balls and off you go.

Player B has arrived on time and is on the practice green, a soothing vape to calm the nerves. Player W will arrive in a fluster, flailing cups and equipment, the perennial latecomer. Thankfully today he has remembered his shoes, it’s not always the case..

You have a good feeling about today, you are relaxed and confident as you unleash your opening drive down the middle. Maybe today is the long overdue time that you rip it up.

Upstairs at Golfing HQ, the two gods are starting their shift. Ares, the god of temper known for his cruelty, and Loki the god of mischief. This is not the combination of gods that you would pick if you had a say in the matter.

They are set up in the most technologically advanced studio the world has even seen. It is like a cross between a VAR studio and an air traffic control tower. From here they can see every golf course in the world and control the fate of every golfer.

‘I’m not happy with the pin placements, they are no evil enough’ -says Ares.

‘I will send a WhatsApp to the greenskeeper, we might have time to change the back nine’ – says Loki

You have started steadily with a couple of pars, an absence of dramas. The weather is dry with plenty of blue sky, but there is a challenging wind.

‘Right, I’m going to keep changing the wind dial direction so that it is always in their face’- says Ares

‘Tell me when you want some rain’ -says Loki.

The group have reached the third hole with player W having the honour. He has worked hard with the club pro all year on building a new swing, with more speed trying to find that extra yardage. Oblivious to the fact that at his age it is more likely to be a slow march in the opposite direction.

‘Watch this?’-says Ares.

Player W sends his drive soaring upwards. Slightly left to right, it has a chance of cresting the hill. But then cruelly at the last minute it falls short, rolling back down in to the valley of doom.

‘He cant get it up’ -says Ares

‘Ha Ha, It’s the hope that kills them’-says Loki.

Now its your turn to face the wrath of the gods as you head down to play the fourth hole, that hardest on the course. A tricky drive, with danger right You take two balls, you have been down this road before.

‘ The problem with this one is his ego. Thinks he can play but he has delusions of grandeur.’-says Ares.

‘So, what will you do’

‘Slight adjustment to grip, and then the magic will happen’

Just like that two balls are sliced wildly right, sailing out of bounds howling in protest on the wind. Playing five of the tee, you put a ten on the card, your round destroyed.

‘He will be raging now’ says Ares.

‘I know and he now has to climb cardiac hill’-says Loki

‘Mental note, can we increase that gradient’- says Ares

The threeball endure the torture of their climb up through the wilderness, turning that brutal corner and realising that they are only halfway there.

‘Look at the state of them, a few years ago they were finely tuned athletes’ – says Ares.

‘Any plans for this hole’

‘No intervention needed. Player W has been in that bunker so often the club are considering naming rights.

We move on to the next hole, a stretch where prayers are essential. Not quite a corner but definitely an amen if you survive.

‘Can you pull the stats on Player P please?’- asks Ares

‘Very consistent, shoots almost the same score every week’ -says Loki

‘We need to break him then?’

‘How?

‘Trees’ – they both say in unison.

With a natural swing of left to right he manages to swing it back in to the middle. So some nice bushy trees out short left is the answer. The urban myth of trees being 90% air is nonsense. The statistic here is probably 12-15%. A very satisfying thwack comes up the microphone to Golfing HQ.

‘Make sure you give him some nasty roots, as well’ -says Loki.

You have just about recovered from the horror show of your double figures as you reach the seventh tee. A hole you like, that suits your shape. You unleash your best drive of the day, arrowing past the bunkers, catching the downslope, slap bang in the middle of the fairway.

‘This is the fun bit’ – says the God of cruelty.

He has his moment of schadenfreude when he watches your disgust on the monitor. Your beautiful drive has fallen to rest in a huge divot. Hopes of a par disappearing over the sunset.

Of course, the golfing gods are not always cruel, dispensing misery every step of the way. If they don’t give you some love sometimes then that is bad for business. They let Player W bounce out of the burn on to the green at the 9th hole. Player P gets a kind break from the trees at the 11th hole. They correct your dreadful tee shot on the 12th by giving it a wild kick off the hill on the right. Rolling it to four feet. Momentarily believing that you would get a magic two, a share of the sweep before your putting fragility brings you back to normal.

They save their best work for the 14th hole. They play their hilarious little game of the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. Drawing lots for the three balls, leaving their fortune to fate rather than godly intervention.

Player B draws Bad. His approach from 130 yards looks great in the air arriving front of the green. But takes a massive kick off the downslope taking off like a train. Although the way through the back and in to the hedge.

Player W draws Ugly, so they revert to another favourite, a game of illusion. He takes aim for the green, but it is under hit, heading for the burn. On arrival though he has overjoyed to discover he is still in play. Of course, the joy of this trick is that he immediately chunks it in to the burn.

‘I feel a bit sorry for this one’ – says Ares, as you line up a monstrous seventy foot put. It breaks left, then right, speeds up, before doing a 360-degree loop, like water down the plughole. It drops in with that highly satisfying sound.

‘You are going soft mate’ – says Loki.

The golfers are left to play the final holes in peace and quiet. You reflect on missed chances and what could have been. If you could take out the ten, and probably the eight, it wasn’t a bad score. You still are convinced that it is about swing mechanics, oblivious to the celestial influence from above.

The group wearily trudge up the last hole.

‘Oh, we forgot the rain’ – says Loki.

‘Quick turn it on, a right good soaking before they get to the clubhouse’