The Personal Round Timer

Hubby and I had a Sunday tee time at Rocky Point this past weekend with Debbie Harry and her husband. It’s a gorgeous public course near the water, but the last time I was here, I was eaten alive by mosquitoes. This time, it was a sunny day in the mid-70s, with blue skies and not a hint of humidity in the air. The course was packed with tee times every 7 minutes. The rangers were strict too. They carried walkie-talkies, and the ranger on the first hole radioed another ranger, complaining about our husbands. “These guys are waiting too long to tee off. They’re letting their wives tee off first!” But after the ranger saw how far our hubbies drove their balls, he understood why they waited till the group ahead was safely on the green, and he rode up and apologized.

Apparently pace of play is something of a problem at this course. They even have a gadget on the golf cart steering wheel to time each round. The gadget was like a clip-on beeper with an electronic screen showing the time remaining in your round and what hole you should be on, e.g. “4 hours 35 minutes… you should be on Hole 2 Fairway.” As the round progressed, we fell more and more behind, usually not through any fault of our own.

On a tough par 5 on the back nine, we dallied a bit looking for balls in the rough and we sacrificed a couple of balls in the water. That's when we really lost ground. By the 17th hole, our personal round timer said “0 hours 0 minutes… you should be on the 19^th hole.” Well, the 19^th hole, as any golfer knows, is the bar at the clubhouse. But this being a public course, the closest bar was probably somewhere down the road. I don’t think they’d let us drive the golf carts that far.

And what if we took the personal round timer with us, would it continue to tell us where we should be and at what time? “It’s 5 minutes after your round… you should be in the parking lot taking off your golf shoes.” “It’s 7pm… you should be home making dinner.” “It’s midnight… you should be asleep. Why are you still up watching TV?”

Suppose we had personal life timers. What would they say? “You’re 17 years old… you should have lost your virginity by now.” “You’re almost 30… you should be married by now.” “You’re 35 already… you should have 2 kids and a house with a garage by now.” “You’re 45… you should have made your first million by now.” “You're 88… you should be dead by now. Why are you still up watching TV?”

Golf and life have a lot of things in common, but timing isn’t one of them. In golf, you can’t skip holes the way you can skip events in life. Can you imagine someone saying, “I think I’ll take a pass on that par 3… I just don’t think I'm ready.” Yet it is perfectly reasonable that a married woman forgoes having kids and goes straight to the golfing phase of life.

Golf has rules about pace of play. Life doesn’t. Thank goodness for that.