Sun Dec 19

Since Mother Nature has given us a few days off from golf (hope you caught up with the less important things at home), this may be a good time for a little history lesson about our Founding Fathers. No, you are not going to see names like Jefferson, Madison, or Washington but you will see Hayden, Hill, McIntosh, and Marshall. If you enjoy playing with this group or even just tolerate it because you have no other game, read on to see how we got to where we are.

On a golf course long, long ago, four unlikely golfers got together for a round of golf. Legend has it that they couldn't find any other groups to accept them, so they started their own. After a rather rocky start full of doubts, personality conflicts, rules interpretations, and score keeping issues, things smoothed out enough that they formed a bond that continues today. I was able to join occasionally as a sub, but they stayed a foursome until Dean came along and now, we were at six. The group had started to grow. Let us meet our Founding Fathers

Norm Hayden

Norm is the blue-collar working man of the group. He has always had the sweetest, smoothest swing of the group. He is known for his fiery competitiveness, never give up attitude. Many years ago, he actually threw a club after a poor chip but immediately regretted it. He called me up that night to apologize, saying that is no way to act in front of other players. Thank you, Norm I can honestly say I myself have never thrown a club since. Norm is also known for his great advice when someone complains about a tough lie in rough, sand or other condition: NORM: "If you don't like it there, don't hit it there!" Hard to argue with that.

Andy McIntosh

From the beginning, Andy has been the gold standard for striking a golf ball. If you believe like I do that playing with better players makes you a better player, then I owe Andy for pushing me to improve. It could get very frustrating trying to keep up with Andy. He would finally miss a green and you would think you had a chance until he chipped to about 6 inches. These lessons do come with a cost, you may have to listen to a story or two along the way. Other duties have kept Andy from playing as much as he'd like lately, which explains the rumor he missed a fairway once last week.

Allen Hill

Affectionately known as the Mother Hen of our group, Mr. Congeniality is the nicest guy in the group. His birthday cards are his way of saying hope you have a special day.  Allen always makes sure new members feel welcome and I truly believe it has rubbed off on many of us (some more than others). Just yesterday someone commented how the group has grown but maintains our "everyone get along attitude." Thank you, Allen, for setting such a great example.

Walter "Bud" Marshall

Bud is the Foundation, the rock, the glue, the man, who has kept this group thriving today. Years of making the tee times, inventing the best scoring system at Kimbeland, keeping track of everyone's scores on his trusty clipboard loaded with curled up sheets of paper, organizing everything with very little help from often complaining, always griping ungrateful whiny players. No wonder Bud sometimes gives a little grief back at us. Okay a lot of grief. In fact, all the back and forth sometimes cruel, sometimes comical, always meant to be fun not mean, shots at each other were Bud's way of involving everyone in the group, kind of like an initiation to the new members. You do have to take it if you want to give it with us and that is fine. Just do it the Bud way, with no offense intended. I was fortunate to be Bud's partner for many, many Men's Assoc. tournaments through the years. As you would expect we won lots of Biscuit Bucks and always had a good time, but we always judged our success on how we did against Andy & Norm and Allen & Dean. Once when Bud was asked if he got tired of having me as his partner all the time he answered "Well he's not that good but it could be worse. I could be playing with Andy, Norm, or Allen." Thanks to Bud, me taking over his duties went pretty well because he had everything running so smooth.

Well, that is the condensed version of our history. Let's do our best to keep the tradition going strong following the good example of these good men.

Only 6 shopping days left, I prefer ProV1 or chrome soft. Reminder that our big Christmas Blow out Bash will be at Jeff's house the day after he leaves for Florida. RSVP to Floyd.

If you are playing tomorrow here are your numbers