Golfing

To help celebrate our anniversary, Paul and I went golfing today.

We had a wonderful day at Shoshone Golf Course golfing on a beautiful course.  My scores weren't the greatest, but I did score 13 strokes better on the back nine than I did on the front nine.  And I didn't do too bad for not golfing for two years.

Every time we go golfing, it always brings back a particular golfing moment back when we were first married.  We learned a lot about each other on this particular golfing outing.

We had started golfing together when we moved to Glendive, after we were married.  It was something we enjoyed doing together.  We joined the Cottonwood Country Club in Glendive, and I played in the women's league and Paul played in the men's league.

I can't remember exactly when this particular outing took place, but we were golfing, and there was a group of golfers behind us.  I was new to the game, and so I probably hit the ball twice as many times as Paul did, and probably tended to slow the game down a bit.  We were up on the green, and I remember feeling Paul's frustration because there were people behind us, and he wanted me to move faster playing the game.  On the green, I had become very frustrated, and started scuffling my feet across the green.  And because Paul was frustrated, he told me to lift up my feet, and stop scuffling my feet across the green. 

Well, that did it for me.  The tears started flowing.  Now I was very upset, and started crying.  I think this was a turning point in the early days of our marriage.

When I asked Paul tonight what he learned from this experience, he said that "I wasn't very happy if you were unhappy.  That you were more important than all that other stuff.  What you were feeling and thinking was much more important than what I thought other people were thinking and feeling.  If other people were upset with me, I needed to care about more if you were happy or not, and that was what was important."

He never made my cry on the golf course ever again.  He did understand my feelings much better, and never made me feel that way again.

And I think of that incident every time we go golfing.

Because it was a moment that made me realize that he was willing to put me first above others.....he just needed a few tears to point him in the right direction!!