Trying to decipher what a ball was screaming when it hit me

Golf fun fact: getting hit by a golf ball can cause serious damage

Your agent displays the aftermath of getting hit by a golf ball.

I dodged a bullet this week, but I couldn’t dodge a golf ball.

It was no mere sculled chip shot, or an overcooked lob. Nope, a playing partner dead-pulled a 5-wood that screamed 50 yards and nailed me.

In the aftermath, I think the ball was indeed screaming at me. I spent most of last week trying to decipher what that ball was trying to tell me.

On Tuesday, I was playing the wonderful links-style Tarandowah Golfers Club, which appears as if it were stolen from golf heaven and plunked down in the middle of rolling Southern Ontario farm country. With its gravel driveway and modest little clubhouse, Tarandowah has the feel of an Irish links that you happened upon as you tried to find a decent B & B for the night.

Designed by British architect Martin Hawtree, the original owners didn’t care that their club was about 25 minutes from the nearest city, London. The course moves up hill and down dale between wispy fescue rough and deep bunkers. Thankfully, the new owners keep the course running firm, requiring you to run shots into some greens, and allows you to use a putter from 20 yards off the putting surface.

As members of the Golf Journalists Association of Canada, we were invited last Tuesday to play the course from the same tees as the previous day’s U.S. Amateur qualifiers.

On a humid July day, my partners rode in carts while I walked with a pull-cart, which I believe is why I ended up about 50 yards ahead of one my partners on No. 16, which gently rises to a green atop one of the highest points of land on the course.

The fellow was about 200 yards out and couldn’t seen the green, so I gave him a line over my head and then walked about 20 yards right of his intended line and stood on the edge of the fairway. This was the usual birth that I give most of the guys I play with.

The player, a left-hander, swung his five-wood. He hit it solid but dead-pulled it.

I saw it coming but had no chance. Instantly, my left forearm felt very hot. I sort of staggered around in a circle for a few seconds. I wasn’t sure what damage I’d suffered, but I was shocked: ‘Oh f***, I’ve been hit by a golf ball.’

I was feeling simultaneously angry and worried. I stopped walking and gingerly explored my forearm with my right hand. Phew. Nothing was broken, but a nasty squishy, purpley goose-egg was blossoming.

The guy who hit me roared up in his cart looking wild-eyed and simultaneously horrified and frightened. He appeared more shocked than I was. I jumped in his cart and we roared cross-country through paths and fescue on a bee-line to the clubhouse in search of ice.

Once there, I applied a bag of ice to my arm and a few cold beers on the inside. Once everyone got to the clubhouse, there was much story telling about getting nailed and near misses. A member of our foursome, a lawyer, talked about golfers who sued for “recovery money.” The writer who hit me continued to apologize, but I told him it was my fault for standing too close to his line of fire. He appeared relieved.

After about an hour of icing, the goose-egg was now just a purple lump, so I drove 90 minutes home. As soon as I pulled into my driveway, I felt almost all of my energy evaporate. I was supposed to lead an online call in an hour and then go to band practice. When I hugged Sandy, I felt wobbly and surprisingly close to tears. After a few measly bites of dinner, I cancelled everything and went to bed. It was 7.

The next morning, I felt off, like I was hung-over. I told my story to Howard on our Swing Thoughts podcast, but in listening to it later, I sound scattered and barely able to string two thoughts together. I did two coaching calls with clients over Zoom and felt like I was barely there. I apologized to one client. All day, I felt dazed, wigged out.

I took selfies with my bruise to post on Facebook. After all, wasn’t this the exceptional content that one shares with one’s network? In each picture, I look tired and old, no matter what how much I tried to look bright.

The comments on Facebook expressed their good wishes that I wasn’t severely injured, but they included grisly accounts of people getting hit, including a man who hit his daughter in the head, killing her.

Over the next few days, I heard about golfers suffering concussions, broken jaws, broken faces, lost teeth. About a guy who lost an eye. One friend offered, “If that hit you in the temple, you could have died.”

For a few days, I had this lingering feeling that I was one lucky jerk to have the ball hit me where it did—on the large bone called the ulna—and get off with nothing more than a bruise and some tenderness.

What if I had been hit in the head? ‘Poor Tim. Gee, he was just playing golf. But he obviously wasn’t careful. I wonder if he had a few beers on the course?’

Howard and I agreed that most every experienced golfer stands on an angle in front of his partners, and blithely trusts that they’ll hit the ball close enough to their intended line. We all stand in dangerous places even though we have an inkling this could turn out badly.

All week, I facilitated between being morose and almost giddy. I found myself uncharacteristically angry at slow traffic and innocuous demands on my time. And bad golf shots. I threw a club on Thursday during a round in which I found it nearly impossible to stay focused. It was my first helicopter in years.

I slept poorly all week. On the couch in my living room where I go when my mind won’t shut up at an ungodly hour, I kept thinking that somehow—even though I didn’t deserve it—I was granted a pass that came with some kind of message.

When I sat down to write this, I think I finally started to understand what that ball was screaming at me. I think it’s something along the lines of:

“Wake up Tim. Stay alert, stay awake. Don’t sleepwalk through your life. You’re taking your health, your good fortune, your blessings, even your life, for granted. Stop wasting your time, and giving in to your compulsions. Don’t coast, don’t waste your time, don’t slough off the important stuff. Stop letting yourself off the hook, and rationalizing that you’re always going to be fine. Listen to your instincts. And, for Pete’s sake, don’t look at your phone while driving.”

I was lucky. As golfers say, you have to be good to be lucky. Maybe. Like everyone, I’ve had my share of close-calls and managed to dodge some dodgy situations, and managed to live a rather fortunate life. I don’t want to rely on luck.

I want to live consciously and—as a wise friend says—on my edge.

But I don’t think I need a master plan or commit to a life mulligan.

For now, I’m going to rely on: Stay the f*** awake.