Chaos

Life with Roger never once involved being on a golf course. He would watch the games with his dad, back in the day, and occasionally on his own. He knew the golfers and the stats and what the game was all about, but he never played that I knew of. 

I had the opportunity to watch Jim and Sam play and it was quite interesting. I have no clue if they had good form or hit the ball far enough or hard enough or straight enough,  but I got some great photo shots, and that after all, means something. 

I thought the best shot was the one with a cloud of sand. It had such movement, such action. How would I know that sand and a golfer is not what you want to see in the same photo. I mean, they have these cute little rakes and they hit the little ball then rake the sand in a nice little pattern. Very Zen. 

Then there are the rolling hills. Well, in Tennessee, there are rolling hills. I can't imagine that it would look the same in Florida. Along the way are these cute little out houses, that are probably fully functioning, modern "facilities."  I saw a couple of cute little sheds, they looked kind of like large birdhouses and they held water and gatorade containers. How very clever!   There were stacked stone walls and terraces and brushy scrub land right next to nicely manicured fields. (I think they call them greens)

Dr. Harris would be proud that I did not call this a field or stadium. He would not be surprised that I had no clue what was going on. Interesting that God placed me with a boss that looked at me the same way Roger did when I talked about anything athletic. A puzzled look, perhaps.  It makes me laugh. 

That's ok, neither of them probably knew where stage right was either. 

This just makes me think about how different we were in many ways, yet, somehow we got along wonderfully. We could both look at or participate in the same activity and see it from such different points of view. Roger always saw safety and exercise first. I saw the aesthetics of it all. 

Maybe that is why he never played golf. He did not love the golf cart unless he was using it to make life easier for someone else. If he had played, he would have walked. He would have walked up hills and down hills. I can see why that part is good exercise, but other than that, it really is a slow game.  
He also had a issue with paying someone to do what he could do for free. Walking was one of those things. 

And you don't see a lot of different people on the golf course. Just your party - then you have to get out of the way. And you have to be really quiet.  

Roger's Lesson: You have to know about a lot of different things, but you don't have to partake in all of them. That goes for sports, but it goes for a lot of other things in life too. 

Yes, I would likely have lived out my days never going on a golf course with Roger. That would have been fine with me. But - I'm glad I had the opportunity to see what was on the other side of those rolling hills. I'm glad I got to see the beauty of order sculpted out of wild chaos - scrub land. 

It made me see that in my little world, where chaos could reign, it does not have to. Because God is a God of order and not of chaos, He has helped me to take this fairly chaotic time in my life and find order and peace and even beauty. 

That's pretty special.   Thanks, Cumbees!