A Rich Man's Sport?

A rich man’s sport:  I have an inferiority complex about golf which is hard to believe since I LIVE on a golf course, marshall there, belong to the Men’s Club and have played golf all over the world (at least western world).  

But I still tense up when I go into a pro shop and see my fellow golfers buy thousand dollar sets of clubs, or buy $150 wind shirts.

My father decided to take up golf when I was about eleven.  He bought a beginners set from Spiegel.  He got Dick Reese to give us some discarded clubs from Sequoia School, many with wood shafts (vintage 1940 something).

And the first time we played was at Lake Redding, a nine hole course in Redding.  We teed off on a Easter Weekend at 6:00 am.  Dad told us he wanted to get an early start.  Truth was he was avoiding the crowd because they could play; we couldn’t.

Ironically we met  Rod Curl on the tee, and played with him.  Rod was a Native American who also decided to take up golf, being a baseball player for the gambling of it.  He admitted golf was more fun than pool, which was a source of income for him.   Rod Curl went on to start in the PGA!

 Ironically that same day my future football coaches teed off in front of us.  They belonged to the Country Club, but came to Lake Redding because it was a holiday weekend and couldn’t get a tee time.

And they hit the ball so far!  I remember marveling how they did that; as it turned out on a short 225 Par Four; Lake Redding is a nine hole almost executive course.

And from that day on, even though my love for golf grew to the point of addiction, the inferiority stayed for two reasons:  1.  golf is naturally humbling.  2.  golf is a rich man’s game.

Of course it isn’t a rich man’s game!  But tell those kids at Hiram Johnson that.  I remember when I was recruited at Stanford for football, not golf for sure, and how in awe I was of the Stanford Golf Course.  I must have shot 120, whiffing many times, and I was a much better golfer than that.

Golf should not be a rich man’s game, and since Tiger Woods and Arnold Palmer it has morphed into a middle class game.   Yet, poor kids from disadvantage areas do not get anywhere near the access to courses that rich kids fo.

 But still we see Hiram Johnson, a poverty plagued area, having a team that can’t break 50 for nine holes.  They compete, they learn to love the game, but the wall of privilege and wealth is very clear.

But somewhere in me, and in them, lies the desire to “show them”, to compete and beat them by working and practicing and winning.  

Or am I just rich now and don’t know the difference?