A Very Important Tee Time (4/29)

Our Tuesday will be busy. We'd take a quick train to Heathrow to pick up our rental car, a shiny new BYD hybrid with fewer than 300 miles on it. Our destination is Farnham Golf Club, where my dad used to be a member before we moved to America.

The BYD had a fantastic GPS and was super easy to drive, although it did feel particularly wide on these English roads. Driving on the left-hand side of the road does take a little getting used to.  Where we typically hug the center line, I did find myself tending to hug the curb a little closer than my co-pilot, Stephani, was used to.   But I managed to get us there unscathed. 

We arrived around 11am, and the parking lot was full, so we parked in overflow, which turned out to be the old driving range, which has not changed one bit, since I was a caddy at this course around 1975-1979, except for maybe a ball dispenser. It's refreshing to know that old courses like this don't tend to go away and get built over, even the farm across the street remains as it was, frozen in time, as if I had placed a set of golf clubs in the car, and the sound of the boot closing vaunted me into 2025. The main clubhouse has undergone a bit of a renovation, but it generally has the same layout. The ramp down to the course has been radically renovated from the original design, which had a steep ramp that went straight up the center. Today it has a sweeping ramp that's much easier to walk. 

My communication with Farnham started about six or seven months ago when we planned our trip. I contacted them via their website and got Joanne's kind and very professionally written reply.  They had discussed our request and decided it would be perfectly fine. Upon arrival, we introduced ourselves. Joanne is precisely as I pictured her. Blonde hair, elegantly dressed, professional, cordial, and kind. She asked if we would like to stay for lunch afterward, offered to go and let the people in the pro shop know why we were there, and what we would be doing.  I told her my biggest concern was ensuring we did not interrupt play on the course; we wanted to be quick.

Picking our moment

We took a minute or two to pick the moment and the spot, noticing there was nobody playing 18, and walked out onto the course around the back side of the green.  We walked up about 30 feet in front of the green. The spot that made the most sense to me was beside two small fir trees.  Here you can see the entire 18th green, and beyond it, the first tee, and behind everything, the magnificent clubhouse. I loosened the top of the bamboo tube and told Dad I was placing some of his ashes here because it was one of the happiest places in his life. The ashes were scattered next to the base of the leftmost tree.  As I was emptying the ashes a player who was teeing off with a group on the first tee, approached us and asked if we were lost.  Stephani said, "No, we're just saying goodbye to someone," so the man turned around. 

A rush of emotion

We walked off the course onto the clubhouse deck, where people had started to arrive for lunch. Both of us stood there quietly, acknowledging what we had just done and how much he would have loved it. We went into the clubhouse, ordered a drink from the bar, and sat down, looking out the window at the spot. 

Farnham was always in his dreams

As his illness progressed, Farnham was a constant topic of discussion. His apartment contained a few mementos from his glory days playing golf with friends. A 3-wood was mounted on the wall.  He had a painting of the 18th green and clubhouse commissioned from a photograph. The Silver Frigate trophy was on its own shelf above his television.  I am sure he stared at the trophy and painting often, remembering all of those great times with Boy Newhouse, Bill Pascoe, Harry Kerry, Jim Standen, Jim Smith, Johnny Catell, Roger Revel, Colin Pickup. All the names I can pick from memory are those of a young caddy.   

Weekends would start early, my brother and I would go to Farnham with Dad and be assigned to whatever friend needed a caddy.  The going pay was around four or five pounds.  Other golfer kids would go, although I can't remember them. I just remember how tiring it could be to walk 36 holes of golf on a weekend, sometimes 36 on Sunday too, and wait for the prize giving to be over so I could get back to my guitar in my bedroom.  As a caddy, I wasn't expected to make club recommendations like Rory McIlroy's caddy is.  No, just find the club, hand it to the golfer, and keep your eye on wherever he hits it to, and for god's sake, keep quiet.  

Dad would tell the story about the time he was having lunch with his buddies in the clubhouse, watching the first tee, and one of them said to him, "That's your son out there Sid, I can tell because he has the exact same classic golf swing as you."  And it was true. I would stand on the first tee practicing swinging the club. I watched my dad golf so many times that I could golf myself, just swinging the club the exact same way he did.  We would hit balls at the Farnham practice ground.  He had a long tube that the balls would go into after he hit them, we would walk down and pick them up, plonking the tube down on each ball, usually in the evening when nobody was around.  

There was a sub-group of golfers in a golfing society at Farnham called the B.B.B & C. I think two of the letters stood  for Boy (Newhouse), Bill (Pascoe) and the C would be for Colin (Pickup.) They would arrange tournament outings at other courses. I also remember Captain's Day. I think my dad was Captain at one point but can't be certain. 

He loved the game of golf and the camaraderie it delivered. Many of the friends he made golfing went on to be lifelong friends, and he would look forward to writing to and receiving letters from each of them after we emigrated to America.  When we lived in Aldershot, we hosted parties at our house often, and they would all drink way too much. I also remember Dad talking about an experience golfing with Bill Pascoe on one of his rare trips back to the UK, noticing that Bill was often staring into space when they played and saying how worried he was about his mental health. Bill would later be diagnosed with Alzheimer's. Soon, the letters from Bill and Boy would stop. 

Closing a chapter

For me, this little visit to Farnham Golf Club closes an important chapter.  My Dad passed away on January 17th, 2024.  The last five years of his life were very challenging. We don't get much of a warning about the realities of caring for our elderly parents, and in America, it can be tough.  Together, Stephani and I navigated the medical system, and Sid's unpredictable personality, as Parkinson's, Dementia, and Colon Cancer took its toll.  We know how tired he was in the end, and how ready he was. Casting a portion of his ashes at Farnham fulfills a dream he once had, as much as it helps me to move on with my own life and complete the grieving process.