7/31/23

“To golf or not to golf, what a silly question.”  This paraphrase of William Shakespeare’s quote from Hamlet seems self-evident to the avid golfer. Avid golfers tend to be obsessed with the game. We play the game because we love it, and we cherish every opportunity to play.  Shakespeare’s actual quote is a reference to living or dying.  Even for the most obsessed golfer, I would hope that playing golf is not a matter of life or death. However, golf is time and effort demanding. So, I ask the question, can you play too much golf?

This year, for the first time since I was in the 11^th grade, I “took the summer off.”  I worked summer jobs in high school, college, was full-time on active duty in the Navy after college, and have been working in education since 1985.  There is a misunderstanding out there that one of the great benefits of working in education is that you have the “summers off.” Well, I don’t know many who take advantage of that benefit.  Most work second and third jobs during the summer to make ends meet. Although tremendously rewarding, education is not the most financially lucrative profession. However, this year I felt that I could finally afford not to work in the summer. I’ll be back to teaching and coaching full time when school starts in late August; my golf time will reduce significantly during the school year. Working from September to June still appeals to me, but I am hopeful that my summer work life is behind me.

What is too much golf? That is going to vary between players. I played a lot of golf this summer. I averaged around four rounds a week and played twenty rounds of golf in the month of July. Having had that experience this summer, the notion crept into my mind, did I play too much golf? What I have concluded from this summer’s experience is that when playing with this frequency, I am still excited to be scheduled to play, but once I get to the course and play, mundanity becomes a factor. One round kind of rolls into another. While I have improved as a golfer, the uniqueness of the opportunity to play has waned. Don’t get me wrong, I still love and cherish every opportunity to play. I know, too, that I am getting to the age where you start to think about how long you’ll physically be able to play. My 91 year old father, who loves golf as much as I do but can no longer physically play, misses playing desperately. If we live long enough, that day comes to all of us. I realize that I am in a golfer’s “sweet spot” at this time in my life. I am able and can play just about whenever I want (in the summertime). Now that my children are all grown up and living out of town, my wife is working and needing her space and quiet, and my work obligations are dwindling, I no longer have the guilt of my younger years associated with playing golf when my attention should have been focused on more important areas of my life. Still, this summer’s golf experience is probably right at the tipping point of excess for me. There have been some days this summer when the weather was beautiful, and I wasn’t playing nor yearning to play. That is a very new feeling for me. I used to think that the only thing that I wanted to do in my “free” time, especially in fair weather, was to hit golf balls. Now, I feel grateful for the times that I can play, but I don’t feel the need to play. The other thing that I learned this summer was that I always thought that when I retired, I would play every day. I hope to play a lot of golf for a long time to come, but for sure, I’ll need more in my life than golf when I finally leave the job market.

Getting back to the to the original question…can you play too much golf? I think that the answer is yes.  Gluttony is a sin for a reason! You can play too much golf as well as you can eat or drink too much.  Professional golfers play or work on their games daily. Like all working people, they need a break or vacation from their jobs to be healthy and whole. Certainly, I will never be a professional golfer, but having had the opportunity to play as much as I wanted this summer, I realized that too much of a good thing is too much, without exception. Ben Franklin put it more eloquently. “All things in moderation, including moderation.”  So, nowadays, I am grateful for the longevity and wherewithal to play golf with impunity, but I am also grateful for the wisdom that comes from experience to know when to say when.