Club golfer stereotypes – No 5: Mr Scorekeeper
We’re here for a casual game, just the two of us, so you suggest a bit of matchplay; mano a mano, a bit of welcome fun from the week in, week out monotony and four-hour torture of a medal. No need for any pencils.
You both par the 1st and out it comes; the scorecard holder (a crime in itself) and the pencil, freshly sharpened.
‘Four for you?’
‘Yes, all square.’
(Inserts number on card)
‘Don’t worry about writing down my scores.’
‘Oh, you’re alright. I’m doing mine so I may as well.’
‘Maybe we could do a Stableford as well?’, you offer feebly.
‘Oh, you’re alright, I always like to keep my score.’
And back they go in the bag which prolongs the misery at the conclusion of each hole.
Oh, you’re alright, stop saying ‘oh, you’re alright’. I was alright when I woke up, I was alright when I arrived this morning, I was alright when I teed off 10 minutes ago.
Now I’m a long way from being alright. Now I’m tight and anxious. I have only hit four shots, and they have all been just fine, and I’m a bag of nerves.
I know what score I’m on, I always know what bloody score I’m on. That’s half the problem I have with golf and why i welcome any small chance to not know what score I’m on.
I now want to simultaneously blow my next five shots out of bounds so my playing partner can quietly shove his pencil where the sun has never shone.
But all I can manage, is a flurry of 5s and 6s, nothing big enough to bring an end to your misery and just right to have it confirmed that I have reached the turn in 46.
And then I do find an adjacent field, and I do it again and again and again. Reload after reload after reload.
And it feels magic.
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1 Mr Sponger
2 Mr Mood Swing
3 Mr Late Comment
Mark Townsend
Been watching and playing golf since the early 80s and generally still stuck in this period. Huge fan of all things Robert Rock, less so white belts. Handicap of 8, fragile mind and short game