My dear Rory,
It’s been a while since I wrote you, and sorry if this one arrives a few days later than most. See, I said I’d let the dust settle a bit. Compose myself to compose to you what the last few days have meant.
Well, we did it! OK, you did it, but it feels like we did it. The last of my adrenaline drained on a tearful call home from Australia, wishing I could be alongside my family in the living room to share in the sobs and celebrations. By the sounds of things in the Butler Cabin, it was much the same for you.
I was late for work on Monday morning I’ll have you know. Didn’t exactly have the foresight to request time off, more just issued an ultimatum at the turn, and when I watched that seven iron whip ‘round the trees on 15, I figured if I was ever going to get fired, then let it be for this.
It was never going to be easy but I’m not sure I was prepared for just how difficult it became. My nails were gone long before Sunday but my stomach. Christ! My poor partner walked into a wall of my farts as you stumbled down the stretch. The pressure had to go somewhere, Rory. And there’s you walking around in white trousers.
In all seriousness, I don’t know how you kept the demons at bay after your ball found Rae’s Creek on 13. You should’ve seen the armchair warriors in my group chat question how a man of your talent could hit such a shot. As if the wheels haven’t come off those boys playing for a fiver.
They don’t get it, Rory. Not like me and you. I’ve been trying to explain it to myself as much as anyone why this win matters so much to so many. Yes, the historical context is there, the mere handful of names to lay claim to a career grand slam and the obvious scale of accomplishment.
But that’s not it. Not even close. This story transcends golf. It transcends sport. It’s about life. How fecking hard it is. The rocky road that nobody tells you about when you’re chipping balls into your ma’s washing machine.
Of course, they’ll claim you have it easy because on the face of it you have it all. Not an iota of consideration given to the fourteen years of shite you copped after blowing the lead in 2011. As if somehow you’re paid enough to take it, or worse, to be immune.
It’s hard to know what more people could want from you. You’re grounded in reality despite brushing shoulders with the stars. Available and relatable. Ready to speak your mind when others refuse, giving us a glimpse behind the curtain of the man behind the talent. That great gift that often became a great burden as mistakes, on and off course, were magnified by a spotlight many lust after without giving a second thought to the cruel scrutiny of its glare.
I’d like to say I never lost the faith along the way, but I’d be lying to you. There were times I thought you’d never win it. That the extent of the heartache was so painful you wouldn’t dare put yourself in position to heal. That’s how I handled my pants ripping in third class, exposing my red Power Rangers undies to a playground of cackling hyenas. I would’ve transferred schools if my parents let me, and putting myself in your shoes, I’m not sure I could’ve summoned the courage so soon after Pinehurst to get hurt again, even with immortality at stake.
I think that’s why I cried so much as the relief poured out of you; the demons swept away as the tide finally turned. You try so hard to convince yourself that it’s only golf. An inconsequential hobby, but sometimes it’s OK to put aside the horrors of the world to focus on your own little bubble. To allow yourself to be selfish enough to want something so badly that the very want itself could kill you. And even then, you might’ve been in your own little bubble but bubbles are transparent, and never has a man golfed so vulnerable to the watching world.
Seeing that winning putt drop was like watching Truman escape the set in the film. In many ways it gave you your life back. Still, I don’t for one minute think that a green jacket completes you. Sure, you may have made your childhood dreams come true, but unwittingly you’ve also kept hope flickering for so many others who’ve quit on that kid inside them because life got in the way.
In your press conference, you said if people put their mind to it, they can achieve anything. I’m not sure I agree. On reflection, I don’t even think the achieving part is important. It’s the hope of something more that keeps us going. That there’s something better to aspire to. Whether that’s winning the Masters as a kid or mastering a sourdough as a thirty-something getting smacked in the face by life. We all need to dream.
And hey, you said it yourself. In this game you have to be an eternal optimist, right? Maybe that’s why I found myself smiling on my makeshift putting green around the side of the house trying to figure out how to sign off on this letter. Smiling when I realised I’d lined up a putt to win the Masters. Commentating to myself like I always did, imitating Peter Alliss on the call. Half watching the golf. Half in my own little bubble. Putting into a glass on the sitting room carpet with a dream as unattainable then as it is now, but one that gives me no less joy today.
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