We teed off at 9:33 at Twin Oaks, the sun already high and the air thick — 74 degrees, seventy-two percent humidity, the kind of morning that gets heavier as it goes. Barely any wind. You laced the opening drive down the middle, 263 to the fairway, wedged a 54 to fifteen feet and two-putted for a clean par. A good way to start.
The trouble on 2 came in the middle of the hole. The drive was fine, but the 2-hybrid from 219 leaked into the rough, and the 7-iron after it went sideways into the native stuff. From there you salvaged it — a 54 to fifteen feet and two putts for bogey. That hybrid cost you close to a full stroke against your own numbers; the up-and-in kept it from costing more. Then the round settled. On 3 you holed a twelve-footer for the only one-putt par of the front. On 4 you found the rough off the tee but stuck a 6-iron from 170 to fifteen feet — one of the better swings of the morning, a green you don't usually hit from that lie. Par held on 5, too, a five that never got interesting.
Then the front nine started leaking. Bogey on 6, bogey on 7, bogey on 8 — three in a row, none of them disasters, all of them the same story: you missed the fairway, missed the green by a touch, and the scrambling got you a bogey instead of worse. On 8 the 58 from 79 yards found the bunker, which stung — that's a shot you normally handle, and it gave up most of a stroke. You steadied on 9 for par, but by then the heat had its hooks in. "Feeling very tired and hot," you wrote at the turn. "Hard to expect better on the back." Forty on the front, four over.
"Ugh feeling very tired and hot. Not hitting it very well and hard to expect better on the back 9"
The back said otherwise. On 10 you flew the 6-iron into the native area, then holed the recovery to three feet with the 58 — that little pitch was worth well over a stroke, the best single swing of the day. Pars stacked up clean through 11 and 12, and on 12 you rolled in a twenty-four-footer that had no business dropping given how the first putt left you a foot short. The one blemish was 13 — drive in the rough, 8-iron in the rough, another honest bogey. Nothing dramatic. You took your medicine and moved on.
The closing stretch was your best golf. You crushed the drive on 14, 285 down the fairway, wedged on and two-putted. On 15 the 9-iron from 131 stuck to six feet, though the birdie putt slid by. Par on 16, par through the run. The one that got away was 17 — a good 6-iron to the green, then a forty-two-footer that you left ten feet short and missed the comebacker. The only three-putt of the day, on the one green you didn't need it. On 18 you closed it out in style: after a drive into the rough and a long grind up the par 5, you chipped in from seventeen yards for par. A fitting last swing.
We walked off 18 at 1:45, seventy-eight, six over, the sun as high as it was when we started. The putter was cold all day and the driver found only five fairways, but the short game carried you home — and a chip-in on the last is a good thing to remember.