The Masters: Is it the Golf or the Serenity We Seek?

A 2018 peek at The Masters at Augusta National and serenity…

Pilgrim on a Long, Long Journey

And for yet another year I visit the Masters virtually. I do so on a device first presented to the public by RCA at the 1939 World’s Fair in New York.

I’ve enjoyed the tournament over television for over 60 years. In some ways it’s not the golf. The joy is more akin to what Joyce Kilmer said of trees. “I think that I shall never see a poem lovely as a tree.”

The numerous, tall, willowy, pine trees over the abundant, manicured grass is a site rich with the beauty of spring. The site heals the soul as do the winding creeks crossed by lovely, stone bridges.

The golfers come and go. They have a game to play. Involvement in the game may be transcendent for the ardent golf fan. But I would argue that the transcendent state evoked from the course’s splendor is richer and would catch the…

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Our “…Odd and Precious…” Lives

“Your problem is how you are going to spend this one odd and precious life you have been issued. Whether you’re going to spend it trying to look good and creating the illusion that you have power over people and circumstances, or whether you are going to taste it, enjoy it and find out the truth about who you are.” Anne Lamott, renowned writer with whom I was lucky enough to take a writing lesson, virtually.

Just one life. It is the people closest to us who manage to forgive us, teaching us about ourselves. Some of it, that is oh so true, we don’t want to hear. But, they love us enough to tell us.

God, please grant each of us the wisdom to hear them.

H. Robert Rubin, a best-selling, Amazon memoirist, a novelist with a draft novelette in progress, and author of Look Backward Angel, How Did I Get Through This? and Please Save the Third Dance for Me, all available on Amazon