Today I played golf with my friend, Charlie. Actually, Charlie is a friend of Mary Lewis, a writing consultant for Florida schools. Mary taught me many ways to enhance children's writing while I was teaching; and everytime she and Charlie made it up to North Florida, I told Charlie I would play golf with him when I retired. Today was that day.
It was 49 degrees when we began our golf game today, so I wore my Gator jacket. But I will tell you now, after the first hole, I shed my hat, my jacket, and my mittens. There was no way I could hit a decent ball with all that garb on.
As many of you know, golf, for me, is not about playing golf. It's about photographing wildlife on the course. Today, in the extreme cold weather, we saw no birds. None whatsoever. I did see three ducks, but if you know me well, you know I'm not crazy about ducks.
Therefore, I photographed two turtles on the bank.
But then something strange happened.
A puppy came bounding over the dunes.
The dog ran up to our cart and rolled over on its back so we could pet it.
This dog was evidentally let loose by road workers on I-75 and totally distracted our game on hole #4 on the Ponds. It followed along side our cart for two holes.
At one point, this dog raced onto the green and grabbed my ball and carried it away. Yes, I was totally distracted.
Charlie finally flagged down the "cart girl", the one who brings refreshments to the course, and he shoved the dog in her cart. We told her where the workmen were and off they went.
It was a great day for golf. Fresh air. Good swings. Unusual animals.
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