He came in out of the rain at 8:15pm without a drop on him. No name. A few blonde shaved hairs covered the sides and top of his balding head. They looked white against his freshly tanned skin. A pale yellow sweater over a blue collared shirt, tan pants and black on white golf shoes. He asked to speak with a golf pro named Joe. He’d just played a round of golf with his son-in-law for the first time ever, and the son-in-law (Charles) after just one lesson with Joe, shot 82.
This score, the man said, was all because of Charles’ lesson with Joe. He was going to tell the whole story right after he stepped outside for a smoke. He pulled a pack of Newports from his hip pocket and fingered a stick. He pulled out a translucent blue lighter and held it in the palm of his left hand. With the cigarette in his right hand he tapped it against his left wrist as he headed for the door. He got halfway there before he turned around and walked back over to the counter. The man said it’s funny how ever since Charles shot 82 the whole family has considered it to be a sign that things are looking up for them.
You see, the man and his wife had a son and a daughter. They were divorced, and when she turned eighteen the daughter moved to New Mexico to be a “slave” for her future-husband’s business. They lost contact, the man and his daughter. She married the boyfriend and they had a little girl of their own. The husband began molesting the little girl when she was four years of age, so the wife took the girl and left him. The husband, back in New Mexico, has faced jail time and he’s not allowed to see either of them anymore. Meanwhile, this man standing at the counter was living thousands of miles away in New Jersey, and sinking deeper into alcoholism. His ex-wife got a job as a librarian–she’s now the director of the M——— Public Library and pulls in $120,000 a year. His son announced he was a homosexual whose boyfriend was HIV positive. At this point, there was still no contact with his daughter.
Last year, the man’s mother and father died within one moth of each other. As he stands there, thumbing the still unlit cigarette, he tells how they left him $300,000 that he was going to try and save for his grandchildren to use for college. Then the daughter comes to him. She’s remarried, her and her new husband Charles have a two-year old, and Charles has just lost his job. They need help. The daughter, she tells dad that this educational toy shop is for sale in C——-. The down-payment is $20,000 and she knows it can bring in a ton of money. She knows all about how to run it because its similar to the business run by her ex-husband. The guy tells her that if she wants the s tore, its hers. They go in as partners and he owns one-third of the business. She’s thirty-nine years old now and after battling depression for almost twenty years, she’s happy again. She’s running her business, working out–she looks like she’s twenty-five years old again. Even the gay son commented on how hot his sister looks now. The man, he couldn’t be happier.
This guy–the smoker who hasn’t lit his cigarette yet–he was a three-time golf-club champion here in New Jersey. They changed the rules at clubs statewide because at the age of fifteen he was beating men twice his age. From that point on, you had to be a full-time member of a club to play in a tournament. No children under eighteen could participate. He dropped out of Rutgers after one year to turn pro. Eventually he settled on being a professional golf instructor and he taught the game for thirty years.
He’s sixty-two years old now and remarried. He says, for the first time in a long time, everything is well and everyone is happy. He’s paying for his son and his son’s “wife” to go on a beach resort vacation with the estranged librarian ex-wife. He thinks she’s going to realize she still loves him someday soon. She doesn’t know he’s paying for her vacation. The man isn’t sure what he’ll do at that point–she’s unmarried but he’s with wife number two. It’s funny, he says, how he used to think his wife was the cause of his alcoholism and not the solution.
Right now he’s not worried about all that, though. Right now, he’s excited about Charles and the 82. The man, by the way, shot 88. With a little practice maybe the Senior PGA Tour is in his future. Again, that’s not really what matters now. This man who came in out of the rain keeps going on about 82 and how its so representative of the family’s recent upswing.
The point of the story is, he says, is–while you can–you have to do everything you can to support the people you love and live well. That $300,000 didn’t mean much to him, he’d made a living for himself and he wanted to use it for his children and grandchildren. Sure he just had his first massage ever and went tanning for the first time, but it’s for them, not him. One day, he says, you are going to wake up and things won’t be the same. You will no longer be able to take care of yourself, and those people you spent your life caring for are going to have to look after you and support you. You can’t risk relationships and fantasize about your own invincibility. Someday, you’ll need the help of others. Are they going to be willing to help you?
It’s an hour later now, and he steps outside with the Newport. When he comes back in he asks for a piece of paper and a pen. He writes Joe a letter to inform him about Charles’ 82 and writes that Joe is the greatest golf pro he’s ever met. The man leaves his name and his phone number and after a “thank you for listening” he’s out the door and back from where he came, into the rain.
