Storm Clouds

August 11

Storm clouds inevitably will gather over us from time to time and often unleash their fury. To successfully navigate our ships over the seas of life, we need to persevere them and look beyond the immediate. I hadn’t played golf in while but had the opportunity this past week, since I was taking some annual leave from work, to practice three straight days prior playing golf this past Saturday. I was feeling very good about my golf swing and the way I was hitting the ball. I can’t say that I had lost the ability to strike the ball well. On the practice range, that is. The golf course is obviously a different matter. I hit shots on the golf course that never showed up on the range and I failed to transfer the good shots from the range to the course. I believe I have officially become a “duffer” on the course, having lost 20 or more strokes in the past 5-10 years. It’s tough but if I have to live with it, I know I can. But stop playing golf? Never!

I was thinking about weathering storms and storm clouds after a storm sprung upon me suddenly during my round on Saturday at Santa Maria Golf Course in Baton Rouge. This photo was taken on the par four tenth, my final hole of the day. Unfortunately, something much more tragic and serious than a bad game of golf happened to a very important person in my daughter Beth’s life recently. Just a couple of weeks ago, her ex-boyfriend was buried. It was quite disturbing to us all, but especially for Beth, who had never stopped loving him. He was a very good baseball player in high school and a straight A student when he and Beth began dating. He was fun to be around, had a great sense of humor, and had a fearless passion for baseball and everything else he did. He never coasted; he lived his life at full throttle. Perhaps that is why he suffered so many injuries during his life and had to give up baseball after high school. It was with that in mind that Beth and I bought him his first set of golf clubs, gave him lessons, and played quite a few rounds of golf with him. We were hoping he would find something that could replace baseball and weather the storm. And for a while he was bitten by the golf bug. But, unfortunately, he found something else. After he had broken it off with Beth, he became seriously addicted to drugs. I had thought and hoped that it was just a phase and he would land on his feet again. Although his parents, friends, and Beth tried to help him, he sank lower and lower, till finally in a moment of despair, ended it all. He could never overcome that slice in his game and could see only hopelessness beyond the clouds. All of his family and friends knew more of his potential than he knew himself. He would have been surprised and pleased with the outpouring of love for him at the funeral. If only…we kept saying. We will miss him dearly.

Although I did not weather the storm clouds this past Saturday (I quit after the tenth as lightening got closer), I will keep keeping on, trying to get better on the golf course. And even if I don’t ever get better, at least I can take photographs of beautiful golf courses like this. I pray that you all will successfully look beyond the storm and find reason and meaning in life and experience clear blue skies ahead. Looking beyond the storm may be difficult because, from our current position, all we may see are dark clouds. It is only in weathering the storm that we may eventually experience that birdie or eagle that we never knew we had in us. Each of you has so much unseen potential that I hope you all can realize.

By the way, today marks the 41^st anniversary for Bebe and I. Talk about weathering the storm! We have been through a few. And, I can say, it’s nice to go through those storms with someone very special on the journey. I could think of no better traveling companion!

foggy vision of unclear sight

foggy vision

of unclear sight

failure to see unclouded stars

failure to discern day from night

they say to succeed

you have to learn to visualize

look into the future of possibilities

to learn to improvise

make something from nothing

so as not to sink into despair

and fact will come from fiction

a wounded psyche will find repair.

© rt tulley