Wednesday, June 20, 2012

Tired of Golf

  A publication I respect very highly got me started thinking about how much I tire of hearing about golf.  My bible study material, no less, anecdotally mentioned golf as in "When you are out with a friend playing golf...".   I've never played it, I know I would be awful and golf is all I've ever heard about.  I'm tired of the whole back slapping expensive foray into an artificial world of that Saxon obsession.  Is there not any other pastime besides golf?  Do I have to play to be considered normal?  Do I have to play to be considered 'in' and worthy of advancement?

It is the whole made up artificial world of expensive whacking sticks, white balls, preppy shirts, natty pants and shoes. Then you get suckered into paying fees and memberships and it isn't enough to just walk then its the golf cart.  Natty haircuts and the inevitable club scene I can only imagine because I've never been there.  Nobody in my families except my sister has even played golf.  Tiger Woods didn't change things for me.  So what? Just another prodigy athlete that endorses stuff and gets to make more money in 1 minute than I will in a lifetime.  It isn't about the money.  It is about the character of predictability.

You can only imagine my mind reeling as this Conservative reads that the person they call President of the United States has played his 100th round of golf in less than 4 years.  I am not counting, who cares.  This is what I want in a United States President- not golf.  Anything but more golfing.

This is what I want.
 I want a president who can sink an 8-ball with the cue stick behind his back. A custom pool cue. I want a president who can climb a rock face with pitons and a resin bag. Or a president who can beat a Russian at chess or split an arrow with another arrow. Or a president who likes guns and hunts jack-rabbits with a S&W 17 revolver and scope in Texas or Wyoming.  Then skins and cooks it over a fire made with weeds and wild sage...for fun.   Or I want a president who maybe has the uncanny ability to sit on a sidewalk and make a chalk mural of Impressionist paintings. A president who can take a performance bi-plane and fly it up into a hammerhead stall with an ABC news reporter in the back seat. I want a president who can speak 2 or 3 languages beside English and play a musical instrument.  A real man who trains his own dogs to herd animals, or pull a snow sled or guard his own life. I want a President with the common touch to take a backpack full of frisbees, his dog, and children to the park. He has to be a guy who wears a cross around his neck in public and may lead everyone in "God Bless America". Someone? Anyone?!

When this multi-faceted President goes to meetings with world leaders I want him to be unpredictable and hard to categorize.  I want him to be mistakenly interpreted as a little bit
nuts.   For example President Quigley goes to a meeting with Islamic nations, walks into the room wearing a yarmulke and says "This is my souvenir that I got the last time I toured Israel. I love it there!  So many stones told me that the God of the Jews is still in control of this old world.".  He should occasionally lose his cool, when needed, with liberals and raise his voice and, using a racial slur, counter them and call them "expletive" idiots then pound his fist and apologize.  Apologize by saying something like "The Lord isn't done with me yet just give me a minute."

Instead of a golf getaway I want a President who can be flown to a remote wilderness, in an Alaska autumn, then, with a parachute and some basic survival gear, step out of his helicopter telling everyone to pick him up at designated coordinates in 4 days.  Nothing but a back pack with a sleeping bag, a knife, a compass, gps, sidearm, flint fire starter, dry pack food, rope and a canteen.  After picking him up, demands to go into an inuit fishing village and play with children by making dolls out of pine needles and buttons from his clothing.  That's a man that would be respected.

We need a man in the Whitehouse that can fly to Russia to play a chess master and utterly lose.  Then smile and say "Jesus loves you but I don't." break out in laughter and bang the guy on the back and serve beer all around that was brewed in Texas. Then say 'okay before you ask me what we're doing in the Persian Gulf what are your plans for Syria and what do YOU think we are doing in the Persian Gulf?  Do the locals benefit from a Russian presence there?'

Or how about a man who, besides English,  speaks Spanish and Arabic  who has taken up the hobby of caring for and riding rescued horses from the nation.  Has built a paddock in Martha's Vineyard and rides and teaches dressage and riding skills to High School students.  When he speaks he thanks the Arabs for breeding the finest horses in the world and in Spanish thanks the Spaniards for bringing them to America.  But when news reporters flock around to find something unimportant to focus on and denigrate him with he chases them with rawhide whips in front of everyone and yells "I don't have enough fingers to tell you where you can stick those cameras."

A real renaissance man like Leone Battista Alberti is what we need.  Someone with a hobby like blacksmithing.  Goes to a forge right there on the grounds of the Whitehouse and with red hot iron and tongs and tools hammers out a filigree for the fence or knife blade for dignitaries.  We need someone who has been to law school and memorized the US Constitution and Bill of Rights but can be invited to jump onto  the stage with Joe Bonamassa and grab a guitar and practice a few riffs then ask Joe to teach him a new lick. 

That's my dream.  If we encourage young citizens to be like that, who develop into presidential candidates, our whole nation will be challenged to elevate itself as a united whole.