[jseth]

I've played golf off and on since I was 12 years old... still love it; The Grand Green Game!

I've always been pretty good at it, too... something I took for granted when I was 14 and a scratch player... I remember the old guys at the Country Club telling me they'd back me if I wanted to turn pro...

But that was 1966 in Southern California and there was a LOT of other stuff going on that felt far more compelling than playing golf... so I walked away from the game.

In 1988, some good friends of mine were yakking about going out to play golf; I made the mistake of shooting off my mouth, saying "You know, I used to be pretty good at that game..."... next thing I knew, they had borrowed clubs and shoes for me to use, so went out on the course with them...

Couldn't believe what had happened to golf clubs since I left the game, but I had a gas! Shot 88 or something, but was bitten by the game, again, big time! All this transpired in a period where I had a modest inheritance from my Grandma, so I began to make up for all those lost years...

Took me about 5 years until I was breaking 70 again, and I began to consider the Senior Tour (now the Champion's Tour)... started working at that goal and was waylaid by a serious car accident. After that, a "little low back trouble" became a major issue to overcome, just to get out and play once a week.

Now, at 68, I don't play much, but I still love it, still remember playing well and finding ways to get the ball in the hole!

There are ALWAYS ways to offset the costs of the game, if you really want to play.

I still play a set of Macgregor VIP irons that I got while caddying at the Cypress Point Club, still have the Callaway fairways woods and hybrid that a Callaway sales tech got for me... still use my little Bulls-Eye putter...

Very similar to playing/buying a guitar, in so many regards... at first, you don't even know enough to know what you want or prefer... then you get some experience and some likes and dislikes and you refine your tastes, again and again, until you KNOW what you want... then finding them used is no problem.

If you wait a year or so, that $500 driver will be available for $75-$150...

Funniest thing is that the game doesn't give a darn about the clubs you play, or how you look or how you swing... it only cares about HOW MANY STROKES it took you to get around...

Kinda like that whole "a great player can make a crap guitar sound terrific..." thing...