I’m going to die, you said. No, you’re going to live to be as old as Batman. As old as Bruce Wayne? Older. As old as the old man who takes care of him in the bat cave. What’s his name, Daddy? Albert. Yeah. Albert. Because you’re a great boy, Jackie, and it’s just that sometimes the Joker gets inside you and he makes you do bad things. I punched Mommy. No, it was the Joker who punched Mommy. I’m still scared. Why? Because I don’t have any money. Why do you need money? To buy you a present for your birthday. When is your birthday, Daddy? In the summer. Don’t tell anybody what I’m going to get you, okay? Not even Mommy. What are you going to get me? Black undies like Batman wears. He wears black ones? Yep. And they’re going to have a little button on them so when you push it a light will come on so you can see in case you have to get up in the night to go pee. How much money will I need, Daddy?
“I really said all that?” Jack asked.
“You did. You used to talk all the time, and I wanted to live forever to hear everything you ever had to say.”
Standing on the 10th tee, I looked around. “Finding my way to this place,” I said, “is something I’m always going to be thankful for. And now you know how to get here if you ever want to come back.”
We chose a spot off the 14th tee box along the base of the ancient stone wall that runs between the Old Course and the Eden Course to bury the ball. We both wrote our names on it, and then I handed Jack the knife and turned on the movie camera. He cut out a square of sod. “The past is past now,” I said to him. “You’re going to go as far as you want to go in this great game. And with some luck, someday I am going to caddie for you on your first pro tour.”
He nodded solemnly, and we shook hands on it.
We played our way in from there. Another good round for Jack, and he finished with a 75 to my 88. He wanted to get to a hotel at the airport in Edinburgh so we wouldn’t have to face the drive in the morning and risk missing our flight home and his hockey game Monday night.
I didn’t expect to ever return here and so, on the 18th green, I took one last look around to remember the ground while Jack waited for me to pick up my clubs. And then we started walking away together.
JANUARY 21, 2007
Flying home at forty thousand feet. Jack had a movie playing on the little screen attached to his seat, and I thought he was done talkingto me. But after a couple of vodka tonics, he wanted to know what else I wrote about him in the journal that chronicled his boyhood.
“Let me think for a minute,” I said. I had kept a journal for each of my children and I decided a long time ago that I was going to give the journals to them to take with them when they left home. “You were a great eater,” I told him. “There was one morning when you were six months old. We were letting Mommy sleep in, and you and your sisters were in the kitchen, where I was feeding all of you pancakes. You kept eating them as fast as I put them down in front of you. When your mother came downstairs, I said, ‘Look at your little boy wolfing down these pancakes.’ She said, ‘He doesn’t eat solid food yet, Don. Nothing but breast milk.’ ‘Well,’ I said, ‘he sure loves pancakes.’ There was no turning back after that.”
His smile encouraged me to go on. “That winter when you were five years old and I was working construction, you waited at the door for me to come home each evening. You would take my carpenter’s belt and say, ‘I’ve got a knuckle sandwich with your name on it.’ ”
I laughed and closed my eyes, recalling how I had hurried home from work each day to see him. “You were a real character,” I said. “I was teaching you to ride a bike when you were four. The safest place was the beach at low tide when the sand was packed hard. The day you finally figured it out, you just rode straight into the Atlantic Ocean.”
“I
“I really said all that?” Jack asked.
“You did. You used to talk all the time, and I wanted to live forever to hear everything you ever had to say.”
Standing on the 10th tee, I looked around. “Finding my way to this place,” I said, “is something I’m always going to be thankful for. And now you know how to get here if you ever want to come back.”
We chose a spot off the 14th tee box along the base of the ancient stone wall that runs between the Old Course and the Eden Course to bury the ball. We both wrote our names on it, and then I handed Jack the knife and turned on the movie camera. He cut out a square of sod. “The past is past now,” I said to him. “You’re going to go as far as you want to go in this great game. And with some luck, someday I am going to caddie for you on your first pro tour.”
He nodded solemnly, and we shook hands on it.
We played our way in from there. Another good round for Jack, and he finished with a 75 to my 88. He wanted to get to a hotel at the airport in Edinburgh so we wouldn’t have to face the drive in the morning and risk missing our flight home and his hockey game Monday night.
I didn’t expect to ever return here and so, on the 18th green, I took one last look around to remember the ground while Jack waited for me to pick up my clubs. And then we started walking away together.
JANUARY 21, 2007
Flying home at forty thousand feet. Jack had a movie playing on the little screen attached to his seat, and I thought he was done talkingto me. But after a couple of vodka tonics, he wanted to know what else I wrote about him in the journal that chronicled his boyhood.
“Let me think for a minute,” I said. I had kept a journal for each of my children and I decided a long time ago that I was going to give the journals to them to take with them when they left home. “You were a great eater,” I told him. “There was one morning when you were six months old. We were letting Mommy sleep in, and you and your sisters were in the kitchen, where I was feeding all of you pancakes. You kept eating them as fast as I put them down in front of you. When your mother came downstairs, I said, ‘Look at your little boy wolfing down these pancakes.’ She said, ‘He doesn’t eat solid food yet, Don. Nothing but breast milk.’ ‘Well,’ I said, ‘he sure loves pancakes.’ There was no turning back after that.”
His smile encouraged me to go on. “That winter when you were five years old and I was working construction, you waited at the door for me to come home each evening. You would take my carpenter’s belt and say, ‘I’ve got a knuckle sandwich with your name on it.’ ”
I laughed and closed my eyes, recalling how I had hurried home from work each day to see him. “You were a real character,” I said. “I was teaching you to ride a bike when you were four. The safest place was the beach at low tide when the sand was packed hard. The day you finally figured it out, you just rode straight into the Atlantic Ocean.”
“I
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