As of today, I’ve been walking around this world for 27 years.
There have been countless faces, ideas, places and passions that have defined those years. Many of them have been connected to golf.
Golf has never been the dominant love in my life. I’m the first to admit that during a busy week I’ll gladly take the 6 mile run over the 9-hole walk. Fitness and family come before four irons, so to speak.
Still, so many memories in my mind and photos hanging on my walls are dotted with golf. My first real job was at a golf course. I wasn’t old enough to drive and I struggled mightily backing the golf carts out of the cart barn. It’s a bit of a miracle the course was kind enough to look past the dents and scrapes and keep me as an employee. I ended up working in some way, shape or form at Elkdale Country Club for seven years.
During college, I spent two summers working for the PGA Tour. One in New Jersey and one in Chicago. People usually ask me about the photos I have with Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson from those trips and how it must have been exhilarating to meet them. No doubt, it was. But, I’d trade those photos way before I’d trade the memories I made with guys like Andy McMillen, Sal Urso, Brett Amman, Brett Sterba, Will Riebe and countless others during those summers.
Then there was the email I sent to a guy named Ron Montesano some seven years back. I told him I wanted to write about golf and he said, “okay, you’re going to be The Mouth That Roars.” Ron’s let me write about anything and everything related to golf and been a great colleague and friend. Last summer we played Bethpage Black, a door that I’d never had opened without Ron. My time with BuffaloGolfer.com has been nothing but positive.
I still remember the first time I played golf at a small 9-hole course with my dad. I enjoyed it, right away. A few years later my father and mother urged me to join the golf team – I didn’t want to at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. It truly sparked this love affair with the game.
I will never be an elite player and chances are I’ll never even be “good.” But honestly, it doesn’t matter. I still get goosebumps watching Sunday at Augusta and each day at the U.S. Open. I’m already excited for the next BuffaloGolfer venture. I still live for weekend rounds with my father and friends.
They say life is what you make it, and I’m one to agree. It’s been 27 awesome years for millions of reasons, but there’s no denying many of them have been sweeter thanks to this silly game we call golf.
[Editor’s Note: This is a Mouth post…we had some tech diffs this AM. As soon as we resolve them, we’ll repost in his space.]
