This is part of a regular series that will chronicle Cameron Morfit's attempt to erase his handicap. If you have questions or comments for Cameron, send them to golfletters@golf.com.
When going into a big transition, it's helpful to remember this headline from the satirical newspaper, The Onion: "Plan to straighten out entire life during weeklong vacation yields mixed results."
I took a previously planned trip to Myrtle Beach, S.C., last week and played 61 holes, because it violates the Rules of Golf to travel to a place like Myrtle and not play at least three rounds. I shot 77-81-81.
If this is progress, it's well disguised.
A six handicap with my own trainer, coach and a new set of Callaways, I've begun a journey to lower my index to zero, or at least closer to scratch than I am now. My scores represent a giant leap forward (an eagle 3) and backward (matching 7s the next day), so after a week I seem to have moved exactly nowhere. Or my handicap has. If anything it's getting higher.
At least I didn't get eaten by a gator, the logo/mascot of the watery Dunes Golf & Beach Club, the terrific, 1948 RTJ track I played twice.
This is worth taking on. I have to tell myself that. I have gray whiskers but I'm only 38. If all goes well, I might play golf for another 30-50 years. It's worth breaking down my game to give myself the best possible chance at a more birdie- and par-filled half century.
I'm playing with a stronger left-hand grip, as instructed by GOLF Magazine Top-100 teacher Kip Puterbaugh two weeks ago. I'm playing with new sticks, including an Odyssey Marxman putter that I don't quite have the hang of yet.
I feel like I'm going to hit every iron shot 25 yards left of target, but the ball's going more like 40 yards left, giving me plenty of practice with my new sand wedge, my new favorite club. I'd had my old wedge for 23 years; the grooves on this new one feel like the teeth of a great white.
The new clubs feel alternately terrific and foreign. I totally mis-hit two approach shots during my first 81, at Caledonia Golf & Fish Club, a pretty Mike Strantz track, which saps me of confidence and replaces it with self-hatred. To paraphrase the great Jerry Lee Lewis, golf shakes my nerves and rattles my brain like nothing else.
When it all goes wrong I've often wished I could be more like Gary Mahar, a scrawny, ghost-white Irish kid I knew when I was 10 or 11. In Cub Scouts we made cars out of small blocks of wood, but we skipped a step, the ball bearings, I think. On race night my car was zooming along when it suddenly just stopped, as if it had hit a rubber cement spill, short of the finish.
I was gutted and had to step outside for some air. Five minutes later Gary came bursting out the doors, howling with laughter. His car had stalled as well. Apparently ball bearings were important. Two losses, two responses.
Round two in Myrtle, at Caledonia, was a total mess. I'd been hanging in there at three over for the first 13 holes, but then enjoyed three three-putts and a pair of 7s while going eight over on my final five.
Here is a sample of the inner dialogue rattling around in my brain like an HX Tour in a Cuisinart:
First two holes (bogey, double-bogey)
It's too hot. I don't think playing today was a good idea. I don't feel right. I should've had the egg-white omelette for breakfast like yesterday.
