Sports

 
I was a big fan of golf and always enjoyed watching the likes of Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Lee Trevino and, my favorite, Greg Norman. However, I never played the game until I was 62 years old. When I was teenager, I wanted to be a caddie or maybe set pins at the bowling alley as some of my friends were doing to earn money but my mother always objected.

I did get to caddie once. I carried the golf bags for my two uncles. All I remember was that my pay was a hotdog and a Coke for lunch. Since my mother was against the idea, I often thought she put my uncles up to discouraging me from wanting to be a caddie.

One day in 1962, two co-workers were planning their weekend golf match and I overheard them commenting that they "hoped to break 100." I thought they were joking when one of them asked "Do you think we play like those guys on TV?" I guess I did think that! Sometime later I was relating that story to a lady friend Anita who told me her son Bill was a golfer and would be happy to take me out on the course. Apparently, she had some knowledge of golf because we went to a golf driving range. She taught me how to stand and how to hold the club. I could hit the ball so I decided to give golf a try.

Bill was happy to teach me the game so I bought some used clubs. They didn't include a putter so I bought a brand-new Ping putter. Looking back, I was actually terrible at golf and too much of a novice to even know it. One day on the first tee box I hit the ball straight up into the air. It hit a tree branch and came sailing back down like a bullet nearly hitting the starter. Still, I was immediately hooked on the game and convinced that I could become a really good golfer.

I did eventually replace my used clubs with a set of Wilson clubs that included three woods, six irons and a bag. And I began taking golf lessons. One day I was apologizing to my instructor for my inexpensive set of clubs. He taught me a very valuable lesson. He took the three-wood out of my bag, hit the ball 250 yards and said "This club works" as he handed the club back to me. Actually, he probably saved me a lot of money over the years. I realized the regardless of how much I spent on my clubs, they only worked as advertised if I swung them properly.

In my second year of taking lessons Anita gave me a birthday gift of a set of irons which were fitted to my swing and my game. I choose Cleveland irons because they felt comfortable. I upgrade to a set of three Cobra woods and for the same reason. They felt comfortable. I later replaced my Cobra driver with a newer model but I still use my Cleveland irons. The one club in my bag that I have never replaced is my Ping putter.

Anita and I began playing golf every weekend at Fairways Golf Course, weather permitting. As I grew to love the game of golf so did a few of my friends. Among my good friends, Sharon and Kevin and dancing partner Shanez and her friend Eric, we could often get a foursome together and played great courses like Shannondell and Five Ponds. After retiring I would play at Walnut Lane municipal golf course. It was near my home and I often played on weekdays as a single. When Sharon quit her job, we began to play as a twosome on weekdays at Westover Country Club. Anita and I continued to play on weekends.

But it was during the long Philadelphia winters that I missed golf the most. Eventually, I began to tag along with Anita when she traveled on business to warmer climates like Florida, Nevada, and Arizona. Florida was nice, Las Vegas was a blast but it was the golf trips to Arizona that I grew to love the most. After several trips to Arizona, I decided it was the place I wanted to spend my retirement years. Anita also wanted to move to Arizona following her son Bill, his wife and her granddaughter. After moving and joining the Red Mountain Ranch Country Club, Anita refused to play golf. Her son and daughter-in-law divorced and my friendship with the entire family withered.

I had one good friend at Red Mountain but I missed my friends and golf buddies in Pennsylvania so I went online to a dating site looking for someone who "liked to golf and dance." I found the perfect partner and we began to enjoy everything together. Joan and I often golfed at Red Mountain but she had a lovely home in Anthem Country Club. After two years together I moved to Anthem with Joan and we joined the Anthem Country Club and enjoyed as much golf as we wanted.

Joan enjoyed getting back to the lady's golf league, the Partee-Niners, and I joined the men's Monday golf league. However, my high handicap was only welcome when I was shooting a good game. Most of these men had played golf from a young age and I had been playing for just eight years. I was intimidated by their long drives and putting skill on the greens and eventually gave up league play preferring to play with friends or with Joan.

Joan had many friends in Anthem and I made friends through her and found golf buddies. However, after about five years we gave up our golf membership. Age was catching up with us and Joan was not playing as often in the lady's league. I was not in the men's league and many of the men I knew were also giving up their memberships to play easier courses in areas like Sun City. For almost 5 years Marvin, Allen, Nate and I played Wickenburg Ranch Golf Course every Friday.

I never did become very good at golf. My best gme was an 86. That's 14 strokes above par. But I could shoot pretty consistanyly in the 90's and I learned that you can tell a lot about a person by their golf game. After getting over trying to acheive a low handicap, U enjoyrd the game a lot more. If you're taking your third or fourth stoke trying to get out of a green-side bunker, pick the ball up anf toss it onto the green. If you're lucky enough to toss the ball less than a putter's-length from the hole, take a "gimmie." Some players shave 10 strokes off of their game by not putting until th ball drops in the hole.

Anothr trick on the green is to place their marker in front of their ball to clean it and then putting it down in front of the marker. However, don't be the guy walking around the green and dangling your putter like a pendulim to line up your third putt. If your behind a tree, sitting on a tree root ur up agaunst a wall or a fence, kick your nall out to where tou have a shot without the risk of breaking your club or your wrist.

The best golfers hit a long, straight ball, keeping it in the fairway. A lot of young golfers hit a long ball but are seldom in the fairway, They may have a short chip-shot to the greeb from the rough but a good 139 yard second shot from the fairway works just as well. For most of us, hitting a fade or a draw is more often by accident than on purpose.

Today Joan and I still enjoy a little golf together, our dancing, our friends, our travels, and growing old together. What I've learned about golf is that I'm never going to be good at it but I have gotten better and enjoy regular weekly games with good friends at Palmbrook CC or Union Hills GC.

 
There is a lot of evidence that the game of darts originated among soldiers throwing cut arrows or cross bow bolts at the bottom of a barrel. Today, Darts is a game whereby a player throws three darts per visit to the board. However, English Darts and American Darts are remarkably different games with different darts and different boards.

I began playing English darts while managing the JCPenney Service Center in Centerville, Ohio. The business next door manufactured darts. To promote his business the owner set up a "dart night" at a nearby pub that was popular among the local businesses for happy hour. He sometimes added a little entertainment to dart nights by having his wife hold a cigarette in her mouth in front of the dart board's bullseye. He had fashioned a large nail into a dart, no feathers, and he would throw the nail like a knife and "nail" the cigarette to the bullseye.

I learned to play darts on those dart nights. Members of the local dart league were teamed up with a novice player. The small "entrance fee" was divided up between first and second place teams and the bar threw in a six-pack of beer for third place. I soon became good enough that I was winning consistently and eventually joined the league. With the encouragement of my fellow players, I entered a couple of Ohio dart tournaments.

I was not so successful in the tournaments but I met dart shooters from other states. One player from Philadelphia, known as "Tex," carried two sets of darts in "holsters" on his hips. After JCPenney transferred me to New Jersey I went to a pub in Philadelphia where Tex was known to play. To begin a game of darts each player throws a dart at the bullseye. The player closest to the bullseye shoots first. I decided not to join the competition when I watched Tex and his opponent throw three darts into the inner red bullseye standing backwards to the dart board.

In New Jersey I joined the South Jersey English Dart League and played for the Mt. Royal Inn in Mt. Royal, NJ. I could hold my own against some of the best shooters and became popular enough to be elected president of the League and served for six years.

During that time two members of the league had developed a unique method of creating a "handicap" that was unheard of in the game of darts. I helped them create a score sheet that could be used during league play to determine a player's handicap. To help tabulate the scores and handicaps I created a computer program and secretly put it on JCPenney's computer. The league secretary and I would enter the data every Wednesday night after league play, the computer printed the results and we mailed them the same night.

An American Dart is simply a wooden barrel with a metal tip bored into the end and turkey-feather flights glued into place. However, an English Dart has four parts: The point, the barrel, the shaft and the flight. The choice of barrel, shaft, and flight will depend a great deal on the individual player's throwing style.

Both dart boards have sectors with numbers 1 through 20 arranged the same with the number 20 at the top. Both boards have a single scoring area, a double scoring ring, a triple scoring ring and a bullseye. But the boards' similarities end there.

American Dart Boards are made of wood with a single red bullseye at its center. The scoring area on American Dart Boards extends from the center bullseye to a red double score ring and the uncolored triple score ring. The large blue ring is not part of the scoring area.

English Dart Boards are made of compressed sisal fibers with a double bullseye at its center. The fibers on an English board separate when the dart enters doing little or no damage to the board. The wire number ring can be rotated to prevent excessive wear. The scoring area on English Dart Boards extends from the center bullseye, or cork, to an outer double score ring. The triple score ring is halfway between and the double ring and the bullseye. The double bullseye scores 25 points in the green area and 50 points at its red center.

The American dart game is Baseball. It's a simple game where players begin with "inning" number one and continue in order until they have shot nine innings. They take turns shooting three darts at sectors 1 through 9 in that order. A dart scores 1 "run" in the single scoring area of a sector, 2 runs in the double ring, and 3 runs in the triple ring of that sector. The highest score, or number of "home runs," at the end of nine innings is the winner. Baseball can also be played on an English board and the scoring is 1 run for a single, 2 for a double and 3 for a triple.

English dart games are more complicated. The most common game has the goal of reducing a fixed score, either 301, 501 or 601 to zero. The players take turns shooting three darts. A dart in the double ring counts double the sector score and a dart in the triple ring counts triple the sector score. The score for the three darts is totaled and subtracted from the "01" number. The throw that reduces a player's score to zero must occur on the outer double ring and is known as the Double Out shot. If the player's score goes below zero, it is a "bust" and the score is reset to the previous value and the remainder of the turn is forfeited.

The biggest challenge in "01" games is knowing the shots needed to win the game with three darts where the final shot is a double out shot. For example, to win with a score of 114 a player must shoot a triple 20, single 14, and a double 20 to win the game (60+14+40=114). But there is help if you have an Out Shot Chart posted nearby.

Another English game is Cricket. It uses only sectors 20 through 15 and the bullseye. The purpose of the game is too "close" all of the sectors and the bullseye before your opponent. The players take turns shooting three darts. The sector is closed when the score of the dart or darts in that sector is "3." A dart in the double ring counts as 2 and in the triple ring counts as 3. In cricket "points" are scored against an opponent by landing a dart in a sector that the opponent has not close. It is possible to win Cricket with just three throws; two throws for six triples (20-15), a single bull and a double bull.

 
Some people are against guns. But if you have never shot a gun, chances are you know nothing about guns or about ammunition. To shoot a gun you must load it, aim it, and pull the trigger. For safety you should always assume every gun is loaded, never point a gun at anything you wouldn't want to destroy and never put your finger on the trigger until you are ready to shoot.

Until a gun is loaded, it is no more dangerous than a hammer. Loaded guns cannot "go off" even if they are dropped or thrown unless they damaged in some way. Still, guns can be dangerous and no one should own a gun until they have learned how to handle it in a way that it is not dangerous. Knives are dangerous weapons but most people have knives. Sharp knives. They don't consider them dangerous because they have learned how to handle a knife so it is not dangerous. Likewise, they've learned how to drive their car so it is not dangerous. And so, it should be with guns.

Laws alone will not eliminate violence and taking guns away from people who own one to protect themselves would just result in criminals with guns meeting no resistance. Organizations like the NRA and the USCCA are all about responsible gun ownership and protecting second amendment rights. They do NOT promote violence or criminal activity.

Automatic and semiautomatuc weapons are often confused by inexperienced and uninformed people. Automatic weapons are considered assault weapon or weapons of war. Pull the trigger once and they continue to fire rounds until the trigger is released. It is illegal to buy and sell automatic weapons and even illegal to convert a weapon into an automatic weapon. With semiautomatic weapons you must pull the trigger and release it for every shot. There was a time when you had to reload a pistol and a rifle after every shot. In 1791 the revolver was invented and you didn't have to reload after every shot. Later rifles were designed this way and these guns became known as semi-automatic weapons.

When I was in the military, we learned that our rifle was our best friend. We learned how to handle our rifle and how to respect it. I could "break it down" and put it back together in the dark. I liked shooting and was considered a very good shot. Not a Marksman but a good shot.

My brother and I both owned Daisy BB guns when we were young and we made a shooting gallery in our basement. Our gallery had two wood shelves and we had little rubber cowboys and Indians that we sat on the shelves. We practiced our aim by shooting the rubber figures off the shelves. We were both deadly accurate and could even "shoot from the hip." We hung an old quilt up behind our gallery so the BBs would fall into a tray. We would collect the BBs from the tray and fill the magazine back up. It's a stretch but BB guns are semi-automatic.

I enjoy target shooting but not hunting. After I graduated from using a BB gun to using a .22 rifle, I once shot an opossum. With my bow I shot an arrow at a bird in its nest. The bird flew but when I recovered the arrow it had egg yolk on it. Watching the opossum die and destroying the bird's eggs were enough to end hunting for me. After that I never shot a bullet or an arrow at anything other than a proper target.

I haven't shot a bow since high school and, at my age, a rifle is just too heavy to hold steady. So, I shoot pistols. I own a CZ P10C 9 mm semi-automatic pistol and a Ruger LCRx .357 Magnum snubnose revolver. My P10C is similar to the very popular Glock 19 but I find my gun much more comfortable to hold. The gun has night sights and it is a very accurate weapon. The P10C magazine holds 15 rounds, or 16 with "one in the chamber." My gun was modified by Cajun Gunworks. The slide has been tooled and the trigger slightly modified. It is a prized version of the P10C and is valued at $800.

My Ruger LCRx revolver is a .357 Magnum but it also shoots .38 Special ammunition. It holds 5 rounds of ammo in the cylinder and I dressed it up with a custom Rosewood grip. This tiny "snub nose" is light-weight and easy to carry but it is not the most comfortable gun to shoot, especially shooting magnums. The "kick" is more pronounced than that of longer barreled pistols but it is very accurate.

Because this gun is so small and easy to conceal, I carry it most of the time. I usually carry it in an outside the waistband (OWB) holster because carrying a gun inside your waistband (IWB) is so uncomfortable. I would open carry this gun in its expensive leather holster but open carry comes with some risks. Most notably, in a crime situation, seeing your gun makes you the number one target. Holsters are designed to prevent someone from reaching the trigger on a pistol until it is removed from the holster. Most pistol owners carry their gun in a holster for this reason. Carrying a pistol is not like the movies with your gun tucked into your belt. The very popular 9mm Glock 19 weighs two pounds fully loaded. That's a lot of weight in your pocket or tucked into your belt and there's nothing to keep it from falling down into your pants.

I am a member of the Scottsdale Gun Club and enjoy shooting at their ranges. I also have a concealed carry permit. The permit is not required to carry a gun in Arizona. However, the permit indicates that I have been schooled in the laws and responsibilities of owning and carrying a gun. Ten years ago, only 19 states allowed concealed carry. Today all 50 states allow concealed carry. Many states require a permit but New York and California, the centers of fantasies, theater and movies, have so many restrictions it's almost impossible to carry a gun.

Gun safety is a priority among the gun owners who I know. They respect their guns and they know and respect the following rules of safety. These rules are extremely important whenever you handle a gun and must always be followed:

1. Always assume every gun is loaded
2. Never point a gun at anything you don't intend to destroy
3. Never put your finger on the trigger until you are ready to shoot
4. Always be sure of your target and what is adjacent and beyond it

The rules are pretty self-explanatory. It's easy to see if revolvers are loaded and the bullets, or shells, can easily be removed. Pistols like my P10C are a different story. A bullet in the chamber will fire when the trigger is pulled and the chamber is NOT visible without racking the slide (opening the chamber). Before handling these pistols, it is important to remove the magazine first, lock the slide open and visually and physically check the the chamber.

Again, guns do not "go off." Someone must pull the trigger. Therefore, never put your finger on the trigger of a gun until you are ready to shoot. Learn to always pick up and hold a gun keeping your finger off the trigger and the gun pointed in a safe (or the safest) direction.

 
One of the highlights of my life were the weekends Bob, Joe and I went off for a weekend of camping, fishing and canoeing. Eventually our camping trips became an annual event centered around Father's Day. They were great trips that ended with evenings by the fire and plenty of beer.

If you've ever been camping when it rains you would really appreciate Bob's knowledge of the outdoors. He would bring a huge tarp that we would hang up over a flat, clear area and away from the fire pit. We positioned our tents under the tarp. This kept the ground around our tents nice and dry when it rained.

Bob is an avid outdoorsman and fisherman so he was always right at home in the middle of the woods next to a trout stream. Well, actually any stream, river, pond or lake. He always managed to catch enough fish for dinner. In addition to his fishing skills, he had the skill of cooking over an open fire and he had the recipes to go along with his in-the-woods cooking skills.

Neither Joe or I were very good fishermen but Bob was an expert fisherman. He learned his skills at an early age. We often joined his grandparents on their annual camping trip to Fish Creek Pond in the Adirondack Mountains. His grandfather had a camper on his pick-up truck but we stayed in tents.

Fish Creek's camp sites had sandy beaches so we could swim and fish. His grandmother was an avid fisherman and I guess he was paying attention when she took him fishing. Their boat was sometimes used for fishing but there was excellent boating on the lake and uncle Keith knew the route to go from Fish Creek into Upper Saranac Lake.

Some camp sites had a dock so the boat was always handy. It was much faster to take the boat down the lake to the marina for food and supplies than it was to drive around the lake. One fateful day Keith either lost or forgot the drain plug. He had to jump off the boat at the marina and buy a plug while I kept the boat moving. I stopped long enough for him to get back on the boat with a plug.

Canoeing was also popular. Keith and his wife, Arlene and I took canoes down the lake for a picnic in the woods when a storm came up. This happens often in the mountains. This day, however, there were white-caps on the lake, Arlene got sick and could not help paddle. We eventually made it safely back to the camp site but Keith and I both learned that when you take a woman canoeing be prepared to do all the paddling.

In addition to fishing on our Father's Day trips we always took a day to go canoeing. One year the streams were very high. It made for some great rapids but the danger level was equally as high. We were three in a canoe on that trip with me steering from the back.

At one point the rapids took control of the canoe throwing us to the left bank. A huge tree had fallen and extended out over the stream at a low, perhaps 10-degree, angle. The water was swift and there was no option but to lay as flat as possible in the canoe as we went rocketing under the tree. I lost my hat but thankfully no one was hurt but we all had a new respect for the power of the rapids.

 
The Cincinnati Reds baseball team dominated the National League from 1970 to 1976 winning five National League Western Division titles, four National League pennants, and two World Series titles. The team's combined record from 1970 to 1976 was 683 wins and 443 losses. It is recognized as among the best in baseball history.

I was always a Cincinnati Reds fan and a Pete Rose fan. During all the years I spent in the Philadelphia area, I became a Phillies fan, especially after Pete Rose transferred to the Phillies.

Between 1980 and 1983 legends like Tug McGraw, Steve Carlton, Mike Schmidt, and Pete Rose led the Philadelphia Phillies to win two pennants and a World Series. They might have won another world championship in the 1981 season but they were unable to regain their winning ways after the sixty-day players' strike.

There was a time I enjoyed going to a baseball game. When we lived in Centerville, near Dayton, I took the boys to see the Big Red Machine. But times were changing. The days of peanuts and cracker jacks had disappeared and even the price of a hot dog and beer cost more than tickets in the bleachers. After baseball banned Pete Rose and then went on strike for an entire season, I lost interest in attending the games.

After moving to Arizona, I never became a Diamondbacks fan. I discovered that once you stop following a sport long enough that you don't know the players, the thrill of watching the games is over.

 
Barbara was from Vermont and an avid skier. She took me how to Ski Mountain in Pine Hill, NJ where I took lessons and learned how to ski. We joined the South Jersey Ski Club and enjoyed a few years of skiing in Vermont, New York, New Hampshire and even New Jersey. One of our favorite places to ski was Killington in Vermont.

I suffer from acrophobia but skiing never bothered me as long as I looked straight ahead on the ski lifts. The perspective when going uphill made it appear I was closer to the ground than I was. However, one trip to New Hampshire, the top of the mountain provided a view of four states. I was busy snapping pictures and didn't realize how quickly the trails dropped off. When I finished taking pictures, my acrophobia kicked in and I couldn't control my legs.

I helplessly looked around and found a trail marked "scenic route." It had a gradual slope and no one was taking this trail so I thought I could "snow plow" my way down the trail. Unfortunately, as I rounded the first bend on the trail, it narrowed. There was mountain on one side and a split-rail fence on the other side to keep one from falling over a cliff. I eventually made it to the main trail and, so I waited to regain my composure, the group I was with met me on the way down of their second run. I assured them I was okay. I took the lift back up the mountain but this time I got off the lift and just skied down.

Whiteface Mountain at Lake Placid, NY is another place that offered up a couple brave albeit unflattering stories. Of course, there is the story of the Whiteface trip that I invited Bob and Joe to join me and the ski club. It was a perfect weekend and we had a lot of fun skiing and being together. But my poor sons dragging all their belongings was pitiful. Their mother could be evil when she didn't get her way.

But the top story is the trip we spent the first two days getting off the lift at the half-way point. On the third day we decided to go to the top of the mountain. I hung my ski poles on the chair's safety bar and put my hands in my jacket pockets to keep them warm. As we approached the half-way point the lift attendant seemed to be doing some kind of a dance and waving her arms.

Too late, I relied my ski poles were hanging down below the chair. In my panic I couldn't get them free from the bar, Then, as the chair passed over the half-way point, my poles were bent in half. Here I am on the way to the top of the mountain with bent ski poles. As I suspected, when I tried to straighten them out the broke. I didn't want to leave the broken halves on the mountain so I skied down holding the four half-poles in my hand. Ski pole are more for balance than anything else so I was like a pro skiing down that mountain.

Barbara had skied since she was ten-year-old but once she forgot to get off of the lift. We were chatting. At the top, I got off. Barbara stayed on. When that happens your feet trip a safety wire that shuts down the lift. I don't remember the details but a ladder was involved. When we boarded the lift, I accidently knocked my hat off and the group behind me picked it up. When the lift started, they got off, handed me my hat and looked at us as if to say "We're getting down this mountain before you two yoyos."

One of the most fun trips was to the Playboy Club in New Jersey. It was a public ski resort run by the Playboy club. The "bunnies" were charming, polite, attentive and pretty. Their outfits were actually quite adorable with the French cuffs and bunny tail.

Barbara and I opened the first night being the first and most impressive couple on the dance floor. On the second night, as the band began to play for the evening's entertainment, they announced, "Okay, where are our dancers Barbara and Charlie?" We obliged. That morning at breakfast several people approached our table to tell us how much they enjoyed our dancing.

 
I found tennis in high school and played the game for another 40 years. I wanted to play football in highschool because i was a fast runner and I could catch a football. But they said I was too "skinny." Baseball was anothrr favorite but because of an eyesight problem with depth perception I could not catch a baseball and I was a lousy hitter. I could pitch a blazing and accurate sidearm ball but the best players got to choose their position and being thee pitcher was among them.

I was tall in highschool, 6 foot 1 inch and they forced me to play bassketball. I could make a basket from the "three-point-line" but there were no three-point shots in those days. The problem I had with basket ball was "p;aying the game." Everytime I ran into someone I fouled them but every time someone ran into me, I found THEM!. And, I couldn't dribble always moving begore I bounced the ball. So basketball was not fun.

Then I found tennis. My classmates referred to tennis as a "sissy sport." It was anything but that and I played tennis well into my 50s. When I played tennis there were no two-handed backhand shots and it wasn't necessary to make a loud grunt each time you hit the ball. My sons and I played tennis and when JCPenney transferred me to Dayton, Ohio I got to play a few times again with my brother.