FanStory.com - Saving Mr. Calvin - Chapter 2by Jim Wile

Pretty soon, we finished eating and headed to the golf course.

Malimar Park Golf Course used to be one of the premier courses in the southern part of the state, often attracting golfers from as far away as Los Angeles, about a two-hour drive. Located in the foothills of the Santa Ynez Mountains, it was situated on a beautiful tract of land among rolling hills, mountain views, cascading streams, and formerly lush turf, but in recent times it had fallen into disrepair. Despite the fact that Santa Barbara County receives most of its water from the Lake Oroville Reservoir north of Sacramento, which has had plenty of water for the past ten years, the state legislature had banned the watering of golf courses—even including the high-value putting greens—five years ago. No exceptions were made even for golf courses with their own sources of water, like natural springs and lakes, unless they paid hugely expensive fees. Only the very wealthiest of golf courses could afford them and keep them looking green, while the others took on a straw-colored look. Not only that, but the turf was mostly dead now, and the playing surface was tantamount to uncultivated desert land. Some of the golf courses that still remained had reverted to using oiled sand greens that were used a century ago in drought-stricken areas, even though water was available, albeit not to golf courses.

We unloaded our clubs and went into the pro shop to pay our greens fee (probably a browns fee would be more accurate) of $100 and went to the range to hit a bucket of practice balls before heading to the first tee. As predicted, there were no other groups waiting to tee off, but as we were discussing the rules of our bet—we always played for a small amount of money—an old gentleman came up to the tee, carrying a Sunday bag with a few clubs in it.

“Do you mind if I join you young fellows? It’s fine if you’d rather play by yourselves, though.”

The three of us nodded to each other, and I said, “Sure, we’d be happy if you joined us. My name is Kevin, and this is Paul and Ernie, though we usually call him Dumbo.”

“Well, that’s very kind of you. My name is Art Calvin,” he said, as he offered his hand, and we each shook with him.

He was immaculately dressed in very old-fashioned attire: green and black plaid plus-fours, a dark green sleeveless vest over a light blue, long-sleeved shirt, buttoned all the way up, and a plaid sports cap that matched his plus-fours. The dress code at golf courses these days is non-existent as efforts are made to welcome anyone who comes to play, despite their appearance. The three of us were wearing T-shirts and shorts.

There was no one else around, so we took a few minutes to chat before teeing off. “What do you, or did you do for a living, Mr. Calvin?” I asked him.

“Please, call me Art, Kevin. I used to be a golf course architect. I designed and built a number of courses here in southern California in my heyday, including this one. You might say this is my home course now, and I’m proud of it, even in the sorry state in which we find it today. How about you fellows? What do you do for a living?”

I seemed to be the spokesman for the group, so I said, “We’re all engineers. I’m mechanical, Paul here is electrical, and Dumbo is a computer engineer, but he’s no dumbo when it comes to that, despite the nickname.”

Art chuckled and patted Dumbo on the shoulder.

“Yes, my good friends here enjoy the irony of that moniker, though it is well-deserved, as my surname is Dumbrowski.”

“Yeah, that wasn’t why you got the nickname. It’s because you’d forget your head if it wasn’t bolted on,” said Paul. “You ever see a guy come to work barefoot? That’s Dumbo, and it’s not because he was making some kind of statement. He just forgot to put his shoes and socks on.”

“Excuse me, I’ve only done that a handful of times,” said Dumbo in his defense, as we all laughed at Paul’s dig.

“So, Art. We were discussing over breakfast the sorry state of golf courses these days. As an architect, what is your feeling about what’s been happening lately?” I asked him.

“Well, let’s maybe talk about that later, lest we spoil the round before even getting started.”

“Fair enough. Would you like to tee off first?”

“I used to play from the gold tees, and I imagine you young fellows used to play from the whites or the blues, but as there is only the one set of tees now, I guess it no longer matters whether I go first or last. All this to say, sure.”

He mounted the tee box with his driver in his hand, made a single practice swing before stepping up to his ball, and took a leisurely, compact swing at the ball, sending it smartly down the middle of the hole. One could hardly call it a fairway anymore, as all the area was the same now—a tan or straw-colored surface of dead grass, weeds, and dirt.

The rest of us echoed variations of “Great shot!” as he departed from the tee box. He had a good swing. He didn’t carry the ball far, but it rolled a surprising distance on the hard-packed ground.

Paul went next. He was a tall, skinny guy with a very fast, short backswing, and he hit a decent drive down the right side of the hole. Dumbo was built more like a fireplug: squat and a bit on the chubby side. He stepped up next and hit a skulled drive that rolled a surprising distance, passing both Art’s and Paul’s drives. It wasn’t pretty, but he got away with it.

Then it was my turn. I’m six feet tall, not overly muscular, but in decent shape. I’ve always loved golf, ever since my dad introduced me to the game at age six. I am a good player—not a pro or anything—but before courses really began going downhill, I was a one- or two-handicapper. I loved being on a golf course; I used to anyway, and I would surely miss the game if it ceased to be, especially the time outdoors and the camaraderie of it. I stepped onto the tee box and took a good swipe at the ball, sending it with a gentle draw down the left side of the hole. It had good carry to it but appeared to land in a soft spot, as it didn’t have nearly the roll that Dumbo’s poorly-hit ball had. Consequently, he was 30 yards ahead of me when I got to my ball.

Naturally, he hit me with the old, “Hey, Kevin. Did you hear about the new super Walmart going in?”

I played along. “No. Where?”

“Between your ball and mine.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.”

Art apparently hadn’t heard that old joke before and laughed heartily.

With our second shots, we all did our best to end up on “the green,” which was more brown or tan than green by any account. The best way to accomplish that is to land the ball well short, hope you don’t hit a soft spot, bounce it up onto the green, and hope it stops before rolling off the back. You could no longer finesse a shot in there or achieve any kind of backspin that might hold it in place if it were to hit the green on a fly, as they tended to be rock hard. Judgment came in how far in front of the green to land the ball. If there was a bunker in front, the best you could do would be to try to land it short of the bunker and hope it hit the ground hard enough to bounce over it and onto the green. It was now a different game.

Once on the green, putting became somewhat a matter of luck. It was impossible for the grounds crew to keep all the weeds out, which now had to be either hand-pulled or the surface of the green would have to be mechanically cultivated by a vertical mower that dug about ½ inch into the surface. But then it would need to be rolled with heavy rollers to smooth it back down again, and if the soil was particularly dry, it wouldn’t roll into a very smooth surface. Also, some courses could no longer afford the manpower involved, so weediness was just something golfers had to put up with. You would often see signs on the first tee that said, “Pull a few weeds when on the greens to help all golfers out. Thank you.”

Golf courses with this sort of maintenance were better than nothing, but were approaching the point of not being too much better. We still had the camaraderie and the smack talk, though, and we were out in the fresh air on a long walk, with nice views in the distance if not so much up close, so there was that. I guess you could say we saw the forest for the trees.

We no longer kept a running score for 18 holes, as scoring well was more a factor of luck than skill anymore. There was still that incomparable feeling of hitting the ball in the center of the clubface and seeing it soar majestically where you were aiming it, and I guess that was still the thing that appealed to me the most, though I could get that in an average simulator. That was something we did on occasion, too, but the golf simulator experience lacked the feel of the outdoors with the sights and sounds and smells of nature, the feeling of the wind, and the exercise of walking. It just wasn’t the same.

We reached the 7th, a long, straightaway par-5 hole with bunkers on the right and sparse woods on the left. An unused railroad line ran parallel to the hole on the left, and there was an old rail trestle about 10 feet down a bank that bridged a dried-up stream that it crossed. I had somehow managed a birdie on the 6th hole, so I had the honors off the 7th tee. The green was reachable in two strokes with a good, long drive and second shot, so I took an extra-long swing and really whaled away at the ball. It had a lot on it, but it was more of a hook than my usual draw, and it ended up running down the bank and beneath the old trestle, clearly out-of-bounds. I teed up another ball and put a little less on it but with more accuracy, and this one stayed up top and in play. Later, as we all approached our balls for the second shots, I could see my first ball resting just the other side of the trestle, so rather than leave it there, I decided to go down and retrieve it.

Seeing my intention, old Art Calvin said to me, “Have a care when you are there. We’ll see you back in no time.”

I thought this a rather peculiar remark. Have a care when I was there? Where? On the other side of the trestle? And wasn’t it rather obvious I’d be back in no time? I was just going to pop on through, retrieve my ball, and be right back. The others probably wouldn’t even notice my being gone. As I pondered this, I carefully made my way down the bank, passed under the old trestle, and…

To be continued