“We all eventually date the vanishing and those cold roses in reefs of sympathy. But it’s what fated in the interim that declares us the victors over the game of life”
Danial Van Fleet
May 29, 2012
But for now the sun rises and awakes the gleaming, and makes the morning weep on wet grasses. The wetness evaporates in gentle mist above the green flung clippings of golf course lawns. As the sun takes its sweet time to rise. Clashing colors in plaid pants and crazy bright prints worn by archaic veterans bounce the sun off their skull bones while cursing up a golf storm of vulgarities, then there’s the throwing of their hats into the retired spring breeze while wheezing. Their boney stick legs with knobby knees appear to hold up these pissed off men as if they were plants supported with sticks in a pot. These golf course warriors lose both their composer and their voice as they loudly and maliciously murder words.
As I watch them in their archaic bodies, I can’t help but wonder what happen to those muscular war heroes with swift thoughts and feet that braved the Nazi gun fire. What happened to those heroes that recovered their best friends off the fields of battle while impregnating the Nazi’s regime with hot brass? Heroes that slung their wounded comrades over their shoulders while running through the festival of blazing bullets, all while playing charades in a splaying terrene made for goats, never once thinking of themselves, only those friends who had been wounded or died. Their natural state seemed to be to hold high the honor that all men were poised to carry in these times of war.
These men who came home with devastating dreams filled with sacrilegious screams, and still were able to build the most powerful country known to man or beast. The most powerful since those first rays of the sun beckoned the earth to play. So very powerful that here and now almost seventy years later their grandkids don’t have to worry about another country screwing with them in fear of reprisal. These men who made America the new Rome from pure will and sacrifice. These same boney leg veterans turned golfers are now being defeated by a little golf ball that’s smaller than a tangerine, but whose importance can only be measured here on this battlefield of life. It starts with ointment and vicodins, half toe touches, and a couple unassuming shots of whiskey. As the passing platoon parade of these old stiff discontented men pass me by in their painted golf carts with decals of their previous life, I can’t help but be fascinated with the dry sense of odd humor, and the magnificent irony these former world shapers have fallen to. Atom bombs turned into a small fireworks show on the lawns of the life.
With their cunt caps anchored, braided ribbon and name labels, all dressed in metals of valor, these metal men with metal colored purple hearts, who created this generation’s world take to blood letting links. These gentlemen who unlocked the gates of freedom for all nations now plan to meet on the battle field against one another, and especially the young people of today who they see as innocently ignorant of their former selves, and without giving them their just due or even validity. But who could blame the younger generation, just look at these new ridiculous clown outfits these ancient ancestors wear as they choose to battle on this new battlefield of life. The archaic believe that the young eyes are blind to their once sculpted chest that now hang low like women’s tits resting in a rest home. But their wounds are still tattooed under these ridiculous colored plaid pelts and buried deep into the graves of their thoughts. There hidden on their flesh just below the horizon of young men and women visions alike. The fast fleet feet that burned new trails for us now in modern days have given way to those three wheeled “gets me around the store on a trike’s and of course the four wheel warrior’s golf cart”
Recently I’ve come to know these normally whimsical human beings, whimsical “except when they step on the mine fields of the golf course” and within them there exist a high morality and camaraderie that is on display throughout their life, and is always present for anyone’s respectful viewing. The comical irony of course is how this all dissipates with the sweat of golf swing on wet morning grass, and as the temperatures of their skulls rise above the ambient temperature of the sun above them. These cool collective meek men become blazing inferno’s over that dam little ball. I asked one of them how they could be so cool under fire, under the cannon volley shells overhead, grenades lofting into the air that shared its space with hot brass rounds and bayonets that found their marks. How can you be so frustrated over a simple game? He replied angrily; this isn’t just a god dam simple game you young ineffective, this is war! And every fucking time I come out here I get slaughtered by this piss fuck little bastard of a ball and I’m fucking tired of it. Whoa dude, chill out I said; so I asked him why he just didn’t quit the game. He replied; number one you never ever, ever quit anything, and then with a big smile he said; I love the hell out of this shit fucking game. It’s like war out here kid, you arm yourself with your sticks instead of rifles, you hunt down and you try to kill these other old geezers with a swing. If you’re lucky enough to win the battle there’s a feeling that follows along with a cold beer they have to pay for. You know it’s the sweetest beer you’ll ever drink kid. And then naturally there’s the accomplishment of besting and vanquishing your opponents. But even if you’re lucky enough to win a battle or two, there a lifetime of war scrimmages out here that continue every day. Some you win some you lose, it’s a lot like life kid you learn, you try, you get good and then you die.
Here among these wily old vets you never quit. That’s what I’ve learned out here. Here where the blazing sun replaces the blazing guns and temperatures are an iatrical part of the battles, first you must win and then, and more importantly, ice cold free beer. I now realize these old guys may look innocent and maybe even ridiculous in their bright clashing un-camouflaged uniforms of war, but let them smell your blood on this course of life and you’d better pack up and back up your hemorrhoids. They’ll fuck you faster than an honest john missile whistle, and they do it all while flashing that fake denture smile that say trust me “with that I’m your grandfather look in their eyes”. Don’t ever underestimate these Vikings of war, I’ve seen these skinny legs, big mouth pelicans roll around in the dirt with each other over a simple rule disagreement and I’m here to tell you it was fucking frightening. It was then that I realized that these old WW II buzzards still had some kick in them. These grey unassuming death traps that wait to grind your golf bones into the ground with every round, and gods forbid you give them a break, wham bam thank you mam, Next! They pounce like a panther or a puma on a tightly sprung nerve, something I would have never imagined watching them strain to during their attempted toe touches. Knowing this now I don’t give these grave waiters a second chance. If I get them down in a game of golf I try to end the battle and tell them to keep that unassuming grandfather smile in their mouths, I don’t want to see it. But I do however bow down to them in total and complete deserving admiration for a life well live. When they leave this earth they’ll take a kind of sweet gruffness along with them. We as a nation will miss this. I do however wonder some what about their wives.
On this course of life, all these veterans seem to talk about is how afraid they are of their women; this scares the hell out of me. I mean these women must be treacherous if they scare these old farts. Just another deception I guess, frail little old ladies with cannons hidden in their mouths, waiting for you to treat them kindly. Don’t fall for it or you’ll find your balls in their golf bags and wonder what the hell happened. You can learn lessons of life out here on the golf course. Those lessons are sometimes wise, sometimes nasty, and sometimes they are lessons that can change the world. Things aren’t always as they seem, I’ve learned a few things for myself out here. Never underestimate your opponents in life, never forget to keep some hemorrhoid cream close, and if your coy enough, you might even be rewarded with a cold icy beer with a special sweetness clinging to the top of your tongue and just inside that shit eating grin on your face. Play the game of golf and you play the game of life. Either you learn to play, or you get played.
