I am not a golfer or even what you'd call a fan of golf, but I do read a golf blog. Specifically, I read
Neil Sagebiel's
Armchair Golf Blog. The reason? It's a well written, successful blog model (see:
My Amazing, Undercover Blogging Experiment), and I'm impressed by what I've come to know about the author so far.
I gave some thought to the idea that since I don't
play, what could I share with Neil that relates to golf? Then, my eyes happen to fall
on a box of golf balls sitting in our basement and, instantly, I knew I
had a story to tell.
My Golf Story Begins.
We live in the country on 16 acres of hilly mountainside, surrounded
by people who live on 5-10 acre lots in neighboring developments. A
golf course is relatively close, as the crow flies. My son likes to hike
down to the creek. One day, he came running, and panting up the hill from the woods with his pockets bulging with golf balls. "Mom, I need a bag, there's more down there!"
When he returned, he had collected more than 50 golf balls. You can't see any houses from
our place, and the woods are pretty dense, so we assumed someone must be
practicing from a deck or higher point above us on their own lot.
We all gathered around, staring intently at the collection with curiosity. Chunks of comet couldn't have fascinated us more. The idea that something so foreign to us had landed on our property was mystified us. We found the colors and branding
of the golf balls very intriguing. There were balls by
Titleist,
Nike, and
Spalding and some that were blank. Most balls were white, but a few were yellow or orange and even one that was pink. Some had Virginia Tech's "VT" on them, and one, our favorite (surely a keeper), was a
SpongeBob golf ball.
We told a golf-fanatic friend of ours about my
son's find, and he informed us that some places
like
Play it Again Sports and driving ranges sometimes buy used balls. He quickly added that he'd like
to take a look at the balls in case there were any "good ones" in the collection. We were captivated by his excitement and wondered exactly what made any of these balls one of the "good ones."
Our friend sorted through the balls and made a small pile that he felt were of value. He talked with my son and offered to pay him for those "good ones." The amounts he offered varied from ball to ball. A few of the balls brought in a several dollars each. We took the remainder to
Play It Again Sports where my son received store credit in exchange for the balls. This worked out perfectly since, to us, Spring means swinging at, and chasing, a much bigger ball--a baseball--and it was time for us to buy some of those "good ones."