I found it
Klonie JORDAN

The rules of golf are the rules of golf. There's something called the United States Golf Association which has people who have spent countless hours compiling those rules. Goodness knows how many hot, sweaty days they spent out on the course, crawling around in the sand traps and wandering through the trees and wading through the swamps to make sure every possible scenario one might encounter during his or her round was covered in the rule book.

There is a chapter and verse for virtually every situation. These are not suggested rules. These are the rules of the game.

Now I know that sometimes in a little friendly match, the rules are amended slightly to suit the talents - or lack of same - of the participating parties. This may or may not include rolling the ball in the rough or taking "gimmes" that are "in the leather" (the distance between the end of one's putter and the grip).

Still, this doesn't mean one should forget how to count (a 7 is not a 4) or take advantage of the "gimme" rule (a 6-footer is not a "gimme").

I have played a lot of golf and have played strictly by the book at times and according to various versions of "amended rules" at other times.

I have, through all this, come to the conclusion that the reason I'm not a better golfer is because I don't have any of the "magic golf balls" that some folks seem to use whenever they play.

I can't find them at any store or in any pro shop or on the Internet. Once purchased, these magic golf balls can never be lost. No matter where you hit them or under what circumstances or where they land, they are always miraculously found.

Some folks seem to have a magic golf ball on hand all the time. But then again, why wouldn't they? If you can never lose them, then why would you ever need more than one?

I have seen these balls hit deep into the woods only to minutes later somehow incredibly fly out of the woods and onto the green. I have seen these balls land in the water and then, as if some giant invisible hand scooped them up, suddenly re-appear on the shore, dry and unmuddied and then hit by the wayward striker incredibly close to the flag for a tap-in par.

It is amazing how these golf balls work. You don't really need a thousand-dollar set of irons or one of those fancyshmancy newfangled drivers with a head that looks like a cinder block.

No sir. You could hit this ball with a tree branch, or a shovel, or a canoe paddle. It wouldn't matter because no matter where you hit it, you would be able to find it.

I have seen these balls hit into birds' nests, into construction ditches, into the swirling waters of a storm drain and into the middle of various kinds of snake-infested knee-deep grasses and weeds. And every time, they reappeared with not a scratch on their cute little dimpled faces.

We should determine what kind of material these balls are made of and use that material to make things that we commonly misplace, you know, like car keys. You would never lose your car keys again. Say you dropped your car keys in a mudhole 50 miles away. Well, with this magic golf ball material, when you got home, there they would be, on the dresser in the bedroom.

Folks ask me what brand of golf ball I play with and I tell them I play with whatever is on sale at Wal-mart. I'm not a good enough golfer to pay $40 a dozen for golf balls. But if I could only find one of the magic golf balls, I would pay $100 for it. It would be worth it because I would never lose it. I could hit that bad boy into the open mouth of an alligator and the gator, instead of swallowing it and slipping off into the murky depths, would run up onto the green and spit it out into the hole.

And that's an eagle on most occasions.

Put me down for a "2" boys. Where's the next tee?

Klonie Jordan (editor@gaffneyledger.com) is executive editor of The Gaffney Ledger.