Now that the 2012 Season seems to be “officially” open, it’s an appropriate time to reflect on the most amazing Golfing winter I can recall.  After the long, morale-sapping,  soul-sucking winter of 2010-2011, the Golf Gods made it up to us.

Sign of the Inevitable?

Certainly, I never predicted this.

In fact, in mid-November, I snapped this photo at Byrncliff, bemoaning the “sad sign of the inevitable.”

I suppose it was “evitable” after all. (those skis were used much less than my clubs).

I expected a few more stray rounds, and decided to spend a day at Ivy Ridge going “old school” by breaking out the persimmons and blades.  After every round, I accepted “that should be it” for the season, and was just happy to have played beyond the late-November deadline of 2010.

The rounds kept coming, but after a December 23rd match at Byrncliff, I knew for sure that I could put the clubs away.

Until New Year’s Day.

Of course, that had to be it.  But, by then, we had adopted an absurd level of expectations.  The 10 day forecast was required reading every morning, assuming we could squeeze in another bonus round.  And one of those forecasted days was Sunday, January 8th.

I'm Playing, No Matter What!

Things looked fine that morning, but a strange thing happened on the way to the course, as the skies opened and dropped a few inches of snow.  Then a stranger thing happened … we played anyway.

You may think that wouldn’t count as “extending the season” since we had such conditions.  And you may have been right, except that you needed a tee-time to get onto Terry Hills 3 days later.  That’s right, on January 11th, you couldn’t play without a plan, as 250 golfers descended on the 27 hole complex in Batavia.

The winter was becoming the thing of legend.  However, the potential downside was that our Winter Celebrations would be ruined.  But just to prove how much the Golf Gods were watching over us this year, they treated the Flurrious Organizers with a perfect weekend.  Sunny, but with the perfect blanket of snow to provide ideal scoring conditions for the 2nd Annual Snow Golf Tournament.

Eric Hoxsie @ Flurrious!

Snow Challenges Balance

Hoxsie filled in for an absent Mo’ Golf, and teamed up with me for a -6 under round of 34, bringing a Flurrious Snow Golf Championship Title to the BuffaloGolfer.com family.

At this point, I started wondering if I would ever declare an official end to the 2011 season. I’m not used to my seasons being dictated by the calendar.  To me, it’s “over” when I can’t play for 3 straight weeks.  And I thought we might get there…..

…..until we received these press releases in early February from Terry Hills & Byrncliff.  If you look up “oxymoron” on Wikipedia, an example might be “Super Bowl & Golf Specials at Byrncliff.”

With 3 more rounds in February and a few more under the belt already in March, I finally understand how those Floridians feel with they “no offseason” existence.  I haven’t been able to fall back on the comforting excuse of “well, it’s early in the season.”

But take advantage of this while you can.  As I discovered last March, it can all disappear quickly, so never forget to “Seize the Day!”  Best of Luck to Everyone for the 2012 Season!