A golfer hits his second shot from a dense grove of trees far to the left of the fairway. The shot strikes one of the large trees, bounces back and kills him on the spot. At the Pearly Gates, God notices at once that the fellow is a golfer, and asks, “Are you any good?” The gentleman replies, “Well…I got here in two.”
But this isn’t about golf jokes – it’s about trees. Everyone in the world knows what a large part trees play in his or her life, but nobody should be more aware of it than the golfer, who struggles to coexist with the beast and at the same time admires it, probably a hold-over from his last camping trip.
I remember two occasions in particular when I hit two trees on the same shot. On the first one, at the age of fourteen, the ball miraculously landed on the green and went into the hole. My uncle remarked at the time, “Well, there’s nothing on the scorecard that says how you have to do it.” The second time, at sixteen, I lost a match that I had led all day, watching my ball careen six miles across the parking lot and down the highway paralleling the course – took a three wood off pavement to get back.
A tree isn’t just a tree, you know – and I’m not talking about different species. They have almost human qualities at times, and we empathize with them, especially those that are noble. For instance, In April of 2011, one of the magnolias leading up to the Augusta entrance blew over, and Phil Mickelson was unusually moved by the experience. It was like giving the grand lady a black eye.
Living to the ages that they do, trees can be historical marvels. The Raleigh World Golf Course in Norwood, Iowa has a family heirloom tree with a sign that reminds “go for the pin” types that it’s three strokes for hitting it.
Through centuries of art, trees have served as both creative and functional statements. One of the most striking examples came between the first two rounds of the U.S. Open in 1979. Apparently, Lon Hinkle planted a tree in the middle of the night to prevent golfers from shortening the par 5 by going down the other fairway. It is, of course, appropriately named “The Hinkle Tree,” and still stands.
Come to the Willamette Valley in the state of Oregon, and visit the lovely Trysting Tree Golf Course in Corvallis, the home course for the Oregon State University Beavers. Some of the opportunistic trees have a severe but lyrical bend in their trunks, leaning into the fairway like a catcher signaling for a curve ball, or saying “Hit it over here…c’mon, I dare you…hit it over here.” Beautiful, but eerie.
Trees are both enchanting and enchanted creatures. Even Jack Nicklaus can’t always command them. Designing the course at Kileen Castle in Dunsary, County Meath, he was not allowed to remove a tree through which he had planned to run the 12th fairway…because it was a fairy tree, and you just don’t do that in Ireland. It’s far worse than bad luck. So far, the fairies have held their temper, and the tree is roped off and inaccessible.
Despite being fairly even-tempered, there is a dark side to trees. The “Lone Cypress” at Pebble Beach should have a sign on it that reads “Abandon hope, all ye who enter here,” which is to say, “If you’ve hit a golf ball way out here, you have a lot more to worry about than a tree.” If the “Witch Tree” on the same course hadn’t blown down in ’64, one might say that the place was downright haunted.
Once in a great while, trees are known to attack humans. John Daly came into the Avantha Masters this week with a pretty optimistic outlook, but on the ninth hole, he struck a root, and in his words, it “snapped my elbow.” I’m almost certain that it was a fairy tree, or perhaps he just startled it. It’s sad to see the passing of greatness. If John Daly had hit that thing twenty years ago, it would have been firewood.
So, next time you go out on a weekend golf safari thinking that you’re alone on the course, consider all the silent sentinels peering at you from above as you go about your work, and try not to spend too much time in the midst of them. It will cost you strokes to get out, and it annoys the trees terribly.
