The grind

It has been awhile since I posted, and sorry to those of you who wrote in wondering where I have been. The holidays proved to be busy, fairly lucrative but really just more of the same. The truth of the matter is, the intial wonder wears off, there are few surprises, and you really end up watching the clock just like in any other gig.

I guess the biggest surprise about the job for me is that I ended up liking it so much. I guess that is easy to say since I am only there two days a week and don't have to rely on it to survive. I guess it affords me the chance to show up and leave without feeling the desperation and anxiety that a lot of guys feel. The caddie life is a transient one. There are a lot of guys who work there for awhile (a year or so) but most guys seem to come and go pretty fast. The type of person who caddies at a country club is a guy looking for a quick hit. If it's not there, then it's DTR, baby. ("Down the road.") It explains a lot of the other behavior exhibited by a lot of the guys I met along the way: heavy gambling, drinking and smoking. None of these guys ever struck me as sad or desperate. Lonely, maybe. Maybe some guys felt a little cheated by life, too. It is difficult, and unfair, to generalize. I guess it is safe to say that the kind of guy who walks on the grass looking to make a few bucks looping is the the same kind of guy who can spot the next opportunity and the next one and the next one.

People mind their own business. Guys never asked each other for their last names and even in the case where you would have multiple guys with the same first name, there always seemed to be another defining characteristic to differentiate one Mike from another.

All in all, it was an interesting experience and one that I will not forget soon. Don't know that I made any lasting friendships, but I did come away with some lasting memories.

See ya DTR.

Caddy day

The golf course is closed for maintenance on Mondays, as is typical at private clubs. This is the day that employees are allowed to be members for a day and play the course, as long as you finish before noon. While you may spot some of the bartenders, kitchen help or other employees out on the grass, Monday is the day that we caddies take over. I can hardly get over the irony of all of us who are working for tips and a meager paycheck every two weeks, yet for one day a week, we get to play a course with fewer than 400 members in the toniest part of town- for free! All credit to the course for allowing us to play, as this is not the case at all clubs.
Of course, all the normal vices are in full bloom on Mondays: smoking, gambling, trash talking and golf- all the bases are covered. As we all caddie for ourselves out there, the mood is convivial, relaxed yet focused on the task at hand: winning the skins game that everyone is required to join. In this forum, my lack of enthusiasm for gambling is trumped by the fact that I am a caddie, and caddies wager. Period.
I wish I could report that I rose to the challenge, shot a course record 61 and cleaned everyone out of their hard-earned tips. The reality is that second place to a guy who posted a 74 doesn't get you nothing but a lighter wallet.

Maybe I'll play alone from now on...

The art of waiting

So far it seems that the biggest enemy of the country club caddy is not the bad tipper but, instead, boredom. Three hours on the grass can be matched by almost double that amount waiting around for a loop. As any professional for whom waiting is an integral part of their job (soldier, retail associate, Maytag Man) will tell you, one must come up with novel ways to pass the time. Card playing, smoking, gambling and conversations about card playing, smoking and gambling seem to do the trick at the club where I work.

Unfortunately for me, I don't know how to play cards, I quit smoking and never had the urge to start up again and I learned my lesson gambling several years ago. So what to do?

Mostly I listen, observe, laugh a lot at the stories being told and just try to kill the time as best I can until I get my turn on the grass. Because the irony for me is, the most boring time is the time spent caddying. Watching some retired dermatologist shoot 120 is not my idea of a golf fantasy. So what to do? Well, I have come up with a novel way to hold my own interest while still keeping my head in what I am doing. I haven't come up with a name for the game yet, but basically it involves positioning myself off the tee as close as I possibly can to where their tee shot will come to rest. It is a remarkably simple game, actually. After one or two holes, you pretty much have it figured out how your guy hits the ball: 180-yard banana slice, 140-yard snap hook, 100-yard driver straight down the middle (this last shot is the sole domain of the over-80 set). My goal is to position myself so that I will have to walk as little as possible to find their tee shot.

Yesterday, I got a little too good at it, and found myself having to stay alert so as not to get hit by one of these little dimpled orbs. No matter. I simply integrated "standing your ground" into the rules of the game.

Still haven't figured out a points system or anything like that and it is still unclear how I know when I have "won." All I know is it keeps me awake and somewhat alert and enthusiastic for the next round of tee shots. The players probably think I am one of those pinheads who is preturnaturally giddy about his work. Little do they know it is simply a way to keep from falling asleep on my feet.

The caddy mystique

There seems to be an air of mystery that surrounds the caddie. Who is this intrepid looper and what is he discussing with his player? It is akin the to mystery that surrounds the pitcher's mound conferences in major league baseball games. Are they REALLY discussing strategy about how to get this hitter out? Or are they merely speculating on who will be the next to die on "Lost"?

I have had two interesting experiences so far that have solidified my belief that certain people hold the caddie in reverence. In both instances, my advice was sought as if it were some holy grail by the truth seeking golfer. "How long have you been a pro?" I was asked yesterday. "A pro what?" I thought. On a different loop, one of the players fairly begged me to fix his hopeless swing. Suddenly it hit me: there are some people out there who think that just because we make our living on a golf course that we are all just one qualifier away from PGA Tour stardom. This misperception is no doubt perpetuated by some of us for varying motives. One motive is that we know that bad golfers hold good golfers in such high esteem that if we can do nothing to disabuse them of the notion that we, not Tiger Woods, ought to be the world's number one, then that is something we can lord over them in the hopes of leveling the social playing field and maybe somehow increasing our tip. There are definitely some low handicap players among the caddy ranks. Maybe even some ex-mini tour players. But let's face it, it's almost like making the cognitive leap that your high school gym teacher was just one bad break away from playing in the NBA. Not bloody likely.

The other primary motiviation for allowing this lie to continue to swirl around the ether is that I have found in my short time "on the grass" is that caddies just don't give a damn what you think. I carry your bag and give you a yardage. You give me a nice tip. Simple as that. We have very little leverage in the relationship, and cannot even gain some perverse satisfaction by messing with a cheap customer's food in the kitchen before it's served. The caddy tip is a completely subjective decision and despite what herculean efforts one might make, the tip is pretty much decided on before the first tee shot is hit, not after the last putt is sunk.

In such a thankless job, it lightens the load somewhat to let the golfers invent our personal golf history. Our silence fills in the details.

A good walk spoiled...by your own death

I have been playing and watching golf for over 15 years and feel like I can talk the talk with just about anyone. One thing that is true out there is that you need to be mindful of your surroundings and always be in the proper position. A struck golf ball is a like a mini-missle and can do a great deal of damage to people, places and things.

The trouble with caddying is, try as you might, sometimes your personal safety is compromised. As mentioned earlier, when you are forecaddying, you are expected to be about 150 yards ahead of your players out in the fairway so as to be able to spot their tee shots. Getting caught inside of 150 yards by impatient or sadistic players can lead to some close calls. Such as...

I knew I had a little break between the ninth and tenth holes as the bets were reset, sandwiches were wolfed down and trash was talked amongst the players. I took the opportunity to relieve myself in some bushes strategically positioned about 100 yards left of the tenth tee, but in full view of the players. As I stood there with my hand full, as it were, Joe Neckbone decides to deploy one of his Titleist projectiles. This little SCUD never got more than chest high and seemed to have been programmed to terminate me with extreme prejudice. Now mind you, I am otherwise occupied and have to tick down a list of self-preservation options in the same amount if time it takes you to blink. Of course, instinct takes over and the next thing I know, I am face down in the mud, still in hand, listening to the whistle overhead. I pop back up with no more than a little dirt on one of my shoes, stow everything in its proper place and stand firm for the next player. I'll be damned if the sumbitch doesn't hit almost the identical shot, although this one was about six feet over my head. I don't think I have clearly communicated how BAD these shots were as I was standing a good 30 yards LEFT of the intended target line: the tenth fairway.

You would think that this near death experience would have been met with apologies or perhaps even an admonishment about my positioning. Again, you would be wrong. The only admonishment came when I was unable to locate the first bomb that almost ended my days.

Tough crowd.

On the grass

Training is over and the real work begins. Sort of.

Looped on Saturday and Sunday and as seems to be typical in any new job, things that never happen in a normal round happened to me. There seems to be some kind of cosmic law that controls the correlation between amount of experience and the number of unlikely events that befall someone.

I was assured that "90% of loops are forecaddying." For the uninitiated, what this means is you essentially grab the players' putters on the first tee and take off sprinting down the fairway about 150 yards from the tee while they ride in golf carts. Your job is to keep an eye on all four players' tee shots (forecaddying is a solo pursuit), get to each of their balls before they do and provide them with a yardage to both the front of the green and to the flagstick, meet them on the green, collecting loose wedges and any other clubs they may have used, fix any ball marks on the green should they hit the green from the fairway, attend the flagstick, give them reads on their putts and clean the dirt off their golf balls. All the while you have to attend the flagstick and never let it touch the ground, make sure you are in the proper position on the green, avoid stepping on anyone's putting line, stay out of their line of sight and not rattle all the wedges and other clubs you have been handed as they arrive at the green. Once all have putted out, you need to return all these loose clubs to their rightful owner, replace the flagstick, collect the putters once again and take off sprinting down the next fairway.


Sound easy? Now repeat 18 times.

In the training, they lead you to believe that while you are making your way down the fairways, the players will wait for you to get to your forecaddying position. This is where the disconnect between theory and reality is most evident. Instead of waiting for you to be safely out of range, I think the players derive a perverse delight from launching their tee shots while you are running away and looking back over your shoulder as if you were trying to evade capture like a character in The Bourne Identity.

But back to the "90% of loops are forecaddying" lie. My first loop was a double bagging affair for 3 of the worst, and cheapest, golfers you can imagine. Carrying two 30-pound bags in the Florida sun while your players spray their shots over every inch of a 7-mile golf course is akin to the Bataan Death March. I was paired with a veteran caddy who showed me a few tricks, thankfully. But no amount of experience can prepare you for the moment of truth at the end of 18 holes when bets are settled and caddies are tipped. Or not tipped.

It takes a special kind of person to completely ignore someone's physical labor and specialized expertise offered on your behalf. I don't wish to become that person and I am hoping that that kind of person is not in the majority at this club.

Cut to Sunday, where the complete opposite experience was had. 9-hole forecaddy loop. Great threesome, including a well-known actor. Low maintenance group who were overly generous at the conclusion of the round.

As I was advised by several of the veteran loopers, don't expect either situation to repeat itself. "Never is a long time."

Why so many rules?

I always wonder why the more straight forward the job, the more rules there are. We were handed a printed manual that was roughly 20 pages printed front and back. Some of the more important rules are posted on the wall in the caddy office. I can't quite figure out if everyone is in on the joke, or if turning a blind eye has taken on a whole new meaning.

Some things that are expressly prohibited:
1- Sleeping. I had to contort myself to read this posted rule so as not to disturb the the caddy sleeping in a chair right beneath the sign.
2- Gambling. Are they kidding, or what? You are expecting a bunch of guys who may be asked to sit around for hours on end in a concrete-walled room with no windows to refrain from gambling? Why don't you ban swearing, smoking and thinking about sex while you're at it? Of course this rule is undermined by the deck of cards and stack of poker chips on one of the tables. I was still in the middle of my first day when one of the more seasoned loopers confided to me that if things were slow and I needed to make some extra cash, there was a guy there who would take book. What IS the spread in the Knicks game tonight, anyway?
3- No smoking. I had thought that tobacco use had all but been eradicated from the American landscape. This was before I showed up at the caddy office the first day.

I still don't know how these guys do it: drinking and smoking all night and then out at 7am in the hot sun jogging 7 miles with two 30-pound golf bags on your shoulder. I'm not exactly Jack LaLanne, but I consider myself pretty healthy and I am having serious doubts as to whether I am up to the physical demands of the job.

A friend made an excellent observation today when he said to me, "You know what you've just joined? A fraternity."

Caddying and working at Bennigan's

It has always been my view that people on the lower end of the social and economic ladder have a much clearer view than those higher up that ladder. You can't B.S. someone who has had to hustle and struggle their whole lives. I still have not figured out if caddying is more like being a waiter at Bennigan's or being a stripper.

I'll explain.

Being a waiter in a chain restaurant is a dead end job. The owners of those chains know it and the employees and managers know it. Turnover rates are astronomical and it is a full time job just to keep warm bodies out there on the floor hawking another order of Turkey O'Toole. So what do they do? Every orientation is peppered with long speeches about all the great opportunities for moving up in our fast growing organization. Inevitably the manager will reveal that he, too, started as a busboy but was now the assistant night manager at the Hwy 49 location, which sold more Sticky Toffe Pudding last month than any other Bennigan's in the Tri-Cities region. I guess someone figured out that everyone wants to feel like they can potentially make a contribution to something larger than themselves. The trouble is, most people are pretty clear-eyed about the lines that are being fed to them and basically looking out for number one. If Houlihan's across the street is turning more tables than Bennigan's, then it's goodbye Turkey O'Toole, hello Chipotle Smoked Chicken Enchiladas.

The same seems to be true in the caddy universe. Most of the guys I've talked to have been doing this for a long time and have just followed the money when it was good, and were down the road to the next club when it got bad. They don't seem to be too long on sentimentality or reflection. And they are certainly not falling for the "management training" dodge. The career looper is no more interested in wasting time training someone just like himself than he would be walking over hot coals. They're hoping for that great 36-hole day when they leave the course and head to the bar with their pockets stuffed with cash, like the stripper who finally got off the lunch shift and onto the Friday night shift at Crazy Horse Too. Titles, regular paychecks and chances for advancement are anathema. Anonymity, cash and the chance to continue to lie low are what it's all about.

Training days

We have spent the last three days watching videos about caddying, listening to speeches about caddying, learning the dos and don'ts of caddying, hearing all the wonderful life opportunities that caddying can bring and, at last, actually "on the grass" practice caddying. (A side note: one of the things I love about different jobs and industries is the unique jargon that so many of them tend to have.This, sadly, does not seem to be the case with caddying. "Double bagging" is just what it sounds like: carrying two bags. I have not heard anything as described in Rick Reilly's seminal book about caddying like, "Guess how we end up trunk slammin' last week? We're on 18, right? So we bring this sweet 7 straight down the chimney with some hellacious sauce on it. 'Cept it jizzes into the Johnny Cat and the sumbitch knits us a sweater in there. We take two scoops and it's DTR, baby."
I am still hopeful that I have not heard all the lingo that goes with looping.)

The most salient first impressions are three: 1) the physical demands seemingly exceed the grasp of the average caddy (I'll explain more later); 2) a inordinate amount of time is spent talking about drinking, last night's alcohol intake and the prospects for exceeding last night's tonight and, 3) something about caddying either attracts or produces toothlessness. Looking around the caddy office (have not heard it referred to as a "caddyshack" yet- urban myth???) and you would think you were on an 18th century ship manned by a crew stricken by scurvy. And it seems to affect all echelons of the caddy pecking order (of COURSE there is a pecking order. We're still in America, for goodness' sake.) From the head trainer and lead caddy right on down to the newest recruit. Bad or no dental hygiene seems to almost be a prerequisite. A gathering of caddies looks like an NHL locker room. I have to find out why this is. The transient lifestyle does not leave one time to establish a relationship with a dentist? Alcohol poisoning doing a number on your gums? Errant tee shots in the kisser?

Getting started

First I answered an ad in local Sunday paper that said "Golfers wanted." A little misleading, no? Sort of like an ad in a San Fernando Valley paper looking for "models."
Next came a phone interview that consisted of some general questions about golf... nothing too strenuous. Followed that with a 66-question internet survey that essentially asked 3 questions 22 different ways. The questions covered the gamut from one's willingness to engage in the following three pasttimes: fist fighting, petty theft and PCP use. I guess I did OK because the next thing I knew, I was invited to a group interview at the country club.
You would think in golf mad South Florida that an ad seeking golfers would yield 20-30 sun-bleached candidates, eager to seek their fortunes on the links. You would be wrong. Six of us made the cut, as it were, to be regaled by the caddy master with all the horror stories of things that can go wrong as a caddy. The focus on potential for personal injury I found discomfiting. I mean, I have played a lot of golf. I have even played on courses that wound their way through less than upscale neighborhoods. But I can never recall seeing a club being brandished as a weapon by a coked up felon. I was beginning to wonder what kind of club this was exactly.

Not to worry. As I looked around at the other 5 potential loopers, I had to resist the human urge to speculate on everyone else's circumstances. It is not unlike the game you play in the doctor's waiting room as you survey the other patients thinking, "I wonder what he's got. Whatever it is, I 'm sure glad I don't have it. I'm fine- I shouldn't even be here." The quick first impression produced the following assessment: ex-con, English pub brawler, speed freak 23-year old, lifelong caddy who seemed particularly reticent about his own personal safety and a former line cook who seemed uniquely out of place.

And me.

More phone interviews followed. I have never seen such a rigorous screening process for what is the embodiment of unskilled labor. I am not sure if this makes me feel more comfortable or less so. I do know that the weather is beginning to get warmer and the next phase of the training consists of walking 6-7 miles in the sun carrying two 30-pound golf bags.

Will this be like "Survivor" with some not able to meet the challenge? Will tempers flare and alliances be forged? Or will the drugs and alcohol that we have all sworn we don't ingest get the better of us?

Why caddy?

Why, indeed. As an (over) passionate golfer and owner of a video production company serving the golf business, an opportunity presented itself to become a looper (caddy) at an exclusive South Florida country club. I thought I might just jump in there, make a little money, and be on my way.
Not so fast...