Life Event: Hole in One (1)

The ball leapt off the club on the 132-yard par 3 4th tee at Ironhead Golf and Country Club with a click and a slight slap. For a moment I thought I had hit it my 9-iron thin but it kept carrying to high flight in the mist. The first bounce of the Callaway Warbird ball at the halfway point of the putting surface was soft but solid, the green made moist and slick by a passing flurry of rain.

The previous three holes for me had been a disaster. 7-6-8 on the scorecard. Double-double-triple bogey. My swing was hampered by my confused mental state, the result of woman troubles in personal life, still reeling from the professional decision to reinstate student life as a PhD candidate in London, and physically holding great disdain for the small ring of belly fat that betrayed the comforts of summer for my beer swilling, football mad alter ego. So a lot of swing thoughts and not many of them good. It all changed in a vanishing act.

The swing on the 4th hole felt different and as the ball bounced three times and settled into a gentle role towards the flagstick I watched with bemused curiosity. Unsurprisingly I was the last to tee off on this short hole. Roll. Roll. Roll. Disappear. Poof! But where can a ball on the green disappear? I couldn't have picked better playing partners for this achievement than my Dad, my erstwhile and favorite playing partner and Father Leo Floyd, a great inspiration in my life and a man of such studious virtue as to provide the perfect attesting.

As we drove our carts frantically towards the green, Dad was the first to peer into the cup as we searched for a hidden ridge or cavity. "I can't believe it!" I looked in and lifted my ball from the cup, nestled deeply as if it was born in place. After five years of abundant rounds of golf I made my first hole in one (1). Father Leo and I chest bumped like real men.

Now when we think about life events we typically associate them with specific moments or decisions that transcend to have a cascading impact in our lives. Governments are organizing their online services into life events, moving house, having a baby, getting married, getting divorced. But we know from experience that even small moments, little flickers of light, can have the kind of impact we are talking about. A single moment when you feel a karmic comfort, that for the moment, everything is breaking your way in the cosmos. It's good to feel it, to confirm it is out there and within our grasp at all times.

So from a little moment like a hole in one, not to overstate the significance, a catalyst can be born for a more enthusiastic approach to the complexities and challenges of life. I made birdie on #5 and went on to shoot a very respectable 80 at the Robert Trent Jones Sr layout on the waters of Lake Wabamum, 45 minutes west of Edmonton, Alta on the Canadian Prairie.

The message is to take what we can from the fortunes of life as we navigate the challenges. Know in yourself that inspiration can be found in so many of the obscured corners of life, look and you shall find as it were. Watch and the ball might drop in the cup. Feel the reverberations.

Labels: canada, sport

Chris Brauer Media Project [BLOG]

Thursday, August 18, 2005