Chapter 44

We got woken around two a.m. by whistles and commotion over by the National Guard tents. They were going on a night march, not such good duty after all.

In the morning breakfast line I saw the National Guardsman who had told me this was good duty, he didn’t look like he had a lot of sleep. I nodded to him as I went by, but kept my mouth shut.

He surprised me by saying, “You take the good with the bad, it is still good duty.”

Now that is a positive attitude if I ever saw one.

I hadn’t much experience around the military other than the veterans in my own family. They all seemed to look at life the same way. They groused a little but kept ongoing. I would try to keep that attitude in mind when things got rough, rather than being what Mum called a whinger.

After breakfast, we walked the course. We took many notes as we went. We weren’t allowed to do any putting on the green, but the course marshals keeping an eye on things didn’t get upset if a golf ball fell out of your pocket and rolled towards the hole on a tricky lie.

These greens were like greased lightning. They were also the smallest and had the most breaks I had seen on any course. The bunkers protecting them would have done credit to the Maginot line. Coach pointed out how fourteen and fifteen were at right angles so no matter which way the wind was blowing you would have trouble on one or the other.

Number eight-hole would be interesting; it is a par 5 and would require a 250-yard drive to clear the bunkers in the fairway. They should be declared illegal on all golf courses. I could clear the bunkers.

The real problem is that the only way to get a decent putt was to land on the right side of the green below the hole. This would be an accuracy challenge.

The tenth hole was made to cause me problems. It’s a par four but had a downhill slope with a rough between the 250-yard marker and the green. My normal drive would end up in the rough. I would have to layup and hit the green with an eight iron.

The par four 470 yards seventeenth was a potential problem hole. It was a sharp dogleg left. I could probably position my drive, okay, but if my second shot was long it was a bogey at best if not a double. It was below the hole or be in trouble.

The good news was that most of the sand traps and creek crossings were designed to cause problems for the golfer who drove 225 yards or less. I could drive past most of the problems.

After walking the course we spent time on the driving range to loosen up, but most of our time on the practice greens. There was no question that I had to be below the hole on every green to have a chance of one putting. They were just too fast going downhill.

We had a one o’clock tee time, so we stopped at an outdoor hotdog stand to get a bite to eat. We had just sat down at the outdoor picnic benches when I noticed a girl who seemed to be having problems. She had her hands at her throat and seemed to have trouble breathing. As a matter of fact, she was choking.

I took the four steps to get to her and asked her if she was okay. She couldn’t say anything just trying to draw air but not succeeding. Her mouth was open and I could see part of a hot dog wedged in her throat.

I tried to reach in with my fingers and almost had them bitten off. Not knowing what to do, I slapped her hard in the middle of her back. She spits the hotdog across the table.

She immediately started taking great whoops of air. By that time other people had noticed what was going on. One gentleman came running over and asked, “Judy, are you okay?”

He then turned to me and said, “I don’t know why you hit my daughter young man but I’m calling the sheriff.”

Luckily for me, he didn’t have far to go because a deputy sheriff was standing right there and had seen the whole event.

The deputy explained that he saw that Judy was having problems and was on his way to help her but I got there first. He explained that it was lucky I was the first one there because he hadn’t any idea how to dislodge a hotdog like that.

Both Judy’s father and the deputy looked at me like they wanted me to explain how I knew what to do.

I explained, “I found out real quick I couldn’t get it out of her mouth from the front, so I applied force from behind. I hadn’t a clue if it would work but had to do something before she suffocated.”