Rain, Golf Balls and a new friend.

Storm Clouds

Today we received needed rain early in the morning.  It came right at the time when I was about to tee off in golf with my friend, Gerry Frosch.  Each Saturday we golf together, but before going out on the course, we have breakfast at the HyVee grocery store. 

Today we had our breakfast, first at 6 a.m. and then headed for the golf course afterward as usual.  As I said before, we were about to tee off when the rain came.  Some who were set to golf after us went out anyway, they were hoping that the rain would let up.  Instead, it started to come down harder at about the time they were at the farthest distance from the club house.  Unfortunately, I imagine they got soaked before arriving at their cars. 

The view I have early most mornings at our local golf course.  I have donated many golf balls to raise the water level.

Needless to say I was disappointed at the timing of the rain, but was happy since we so desperately needed the moisture.  The crops in area were at the point of no return as far as needing rain.  I imagine the farmers were giving a sigh of relief when seeing the rain fall on their thirsty crops.   For our family, we have two small gardens that we have been watering twice a day, along with the various flowers that we have on the decks and around the outside of the house.  Though our livihood is not depending on the rain like the farmers, even so, we rejoiced as well at the rainfall. 

When leaving the golf course and coming home, my sadness was soon replaced with the happy realization that many people would soon be relieved to have the rain.  When later sitting on the porch with my wife Anne, I told her, “It seems like the forest around us is giving us a sigh of relief with this rain.”  Anne chuckled and nodded in agreement. 

We solved the problem of our cat Toby eating most of our other cat's (Kelly)
food.  I made a walnut shelf out of Toby's reach.

During the course of the last year I have developed a warm friendship with my neighbor Marty. He is a kind man who loves making his yard and house look nice.  He is gentle in his demeanor, and always has something pleasant to say.  We kept suggesting one to another that we should go out to coffee sometime, and so a couple of weeks ago, we did just that. Marty is a retired custodian from the local school district.  He keeps up his health by walking everyday.  The area that he walks in, is not in the usual locations for other walkers though.  He hikes the perimeters’ of our local golf courses.  He looks for lost golf balls, and hopes one day to sell them to a golf course or to interested golfers.  This offers him a chance to exercise with the immediate bonus of making a profit for his efforts as well.

As a boy, I grew up near a golf course, and I too found and sold lost golf balls to the local golfers.  I found it good to supplement my income at nine years of age with the sale of these golf balls.  To me at the young age of nine, it was like finding Easter eggs that I could sell.  I enjoyed the fun of discovery, and that of selling them.  This added to my income as well as the money that I had earned from having three paper routes.  Now though, I can empathize with the golfers who lose golf balls.  It is expensive to replace lost balls, and it adds up if you have my propensity for losing them on a regular basis, as I do in the ponds on the golf course.  Contrary to some beliefs, golf balls don’t grow on trees, though I have tried to make it look like that by the number of times I have tried putting them in the tree limbs.

Misty morning in the valley below.

Last week when talking to Marty from my deck, he invited me to go with him looking for golf balls at a nearby golf course.  I told him that it would be fun and so without reserve, we went out yesterday in search of the elusive white treasures.  After walking through tall grass, beside clear trout streams and the nearby woods, I came home with 62 golf balls to my name.  Needless to say I was very happy.  Though I did not go out thinking I would find many balls, I was not prepared as Marty had been.  I had no bag, and no ball retriever with me.  Marty gave me his only shopping bag and loaned me an extra ball retriever that he had in his pickup truck.  Marty was then forced to use his pant pockets for holding his finds on the golf course, while I had a nice bag (Marty's) to put my golf balls in.  He though had to tighten his pants up due to the large numbers of golf balls that he retrieved, while I had to be innovative in keeping the plastic bag from splitting with all my golf balls that I found.  We both laughed at the situation that we found ourselves in.  After about an hour and a half, we came home sweaty, thirsty and very happy over our little treasures that we found.  For myself, I thought that I now could donate more golf balls to the ponds and trees without feeling the loss in my pocketbook.  This time out on the golf course was truly enjoyable for me; it was as if I was a little boy again enjoying the hunt of little treasures lost in the woods, and more importantly, that of making a new friend.