redefining driving up to the first tee, and solving caddy hunger one brown bag lunch at a time

The caddy season is winding down.  We might get a few amazing, unseasonably warm days this fall, but the hustle and bustle of green-shirted kids sleepily dragging their butts to the car is becoming less common.  Exhibit A & B:

No one will pose for a caddy photo in the morning, and they get home at different times and they nap or shower right away. Ed seen here wiping sleep out of his eyes, and carrying his shoes.  Reg is giving me the stop-taking-our-picture stink eye.

Lad hopping in the car and Mini bringing up the rear - it was a while ago, but if I had to guess I'd say there was a towel dispute and Mini lost.  It's hard to tell but I think Tank was driving and I think the car was moving when Lad tried to get in.  Of course there is no arguing on the driveway out of respect for a sleeping Mary Ann.

Last year I wrote a few caddy-themed posts and then never posted them.  Instead I shared how that awful family reserved a spot in my daycare and then cancelled last minute- then the caddy stuff was out of season.  Going out on a limb here:  guessing you aren't  opposed to reading something unseasonable.  Thought I'd explain my out-of-chronology posts that are headed your way though.  Please note:  in these 'old' posts, Tank has only recently gotten his drivers license.  

Today Tank enjoys taking the Great White for a ride.  Who wouldn't, with its king-of-the-road feel and its gas cap duct tape closure?  He drove GW to a golf course a few weeks ago for a match.  He used his GPS to find the course and he apparently continued to follow the GPS when he couldn't find the parking lot/entrance.  It directed him down a small narrow path.  

Well . . . it turned out that this was actually a cart path.  Half of his team was standing at a tee box and here comes Tank chugging along in GW.  

I hope they don't cancel the end of the season assembly that the high school hosts to honor the athletes, because I have a pretty good feeling Tank's arrival at the tee in our giant 12 seater, former airport shuttle and his subsequent ordeal of backing up down the cart path MIGHT get mentioned.  

The golf coach always has something funny to say about Tank at these small gatherings.  I brace for it each year, will it be funny-ha-ha, or funny-dear-God-how-is-this-my-son?  

These are a series of texts from Reggie.  
When I look back at our texting history,
 they're almost exclusively 
caddy related.

One year after a match in the bus with the team, Tank was doing his usual asking-50-questions-about-nothing of the coach.  When trying to get the coach's attention, Tank inadvertently called him "Dad."  Well, that was fairly memorable and the entire team bust a gut laughing.  I don't think Tank has lived that down yet.  Another time he apparently convinced the whole team that in certain states out west, a civilian can pull someone over and issue them a citation.  I have no idea where he comes up with his 'material', but he is well known for his  witty obscure insights/BS.

So, I have a caddy incident to share (get excited) and then I plan to post the caddy adventures from last season.  I don't think they'll disappoint.  It is, after all, the 40th anniversary of the movie 'Caddy Shack', so consider these posts my shout-out to a movie that is often quoted if not re-enacted in our house on the regular. 

I know many moms complain that
 their teens don't say much to them
 - at least I have these riveting texts.
This post is lengthier than it appears due
 to these texts inserted - feel free to
skip, they MIGHT be repetitive.

Reg was the only kid caddying one day late in the summer.  He texted me to say that he had waited for hours but he wasn't going to get out.  (GETTING OUT, GETTING A LOOP, etc. EQUATES HAVING A GOLFER PAY YOU TO CARRY HIS GOLF BAG).

Before I left to pick him up, he texted back: Nevermind, I'm getting out.

A minute later he texted to ask me to STILL bring him lunch.  'Big lunch' is implied. I had to hurry- his golfer was going to tee off any minute.

Well, shit.  We live 12 minutes from the golf course.  

I threw together a lunch and started driving.  I texted him at the stoplights:  WHERE AM I DROPPING OFF YOUR LUNCH?  TENNIS COURTS OR MEMBERS' ENTRANCE?

You would be right to assume that the members just love seeing my giant van with peeling paint and duct tape pull into the 'members entrance'.  'Tennis courts' is the 'approved' back entrance for the lowly caddies.  It's where they're allowed to park their cars, close proximity to the caddy shack.

Reg told me to pull into the members' entrance.  Tom, the caddy master, would  grab Reg's lunch because his guy was going to tee off any second.

Tom, the caddy master, is a character.  He's the guy who coined the phrase a few summers ago when my 5 caddies approached his podium where he assigns caddies to golfers' bags:  

"Here come the Shenanigans.  Move of be moved."  

I want that on a tee-shirt.

Tom's a sarcastic dude.  He gives two shits about what anybody thinks.  I double over on the regular when my kids come home and tell me stuff Tom says.  

At one point this summer I was so frustrated with my caddies arguing over shirts and towels AT THE CRACK OF DAWN that I texted Eddie and told him to ask Tom to order a bunch of new towels and I would pay for the entire order.

Ed texted back and said, Tom said to tell you that's what you get for having so many damn kids.  Then he admitted that Tom hadn't said that but he would've if Ed actually bothered to ask him. Somehow my kids know what texts to send and what texts NOT to send, even if their delightful mother requests it, damn it.

My kids heard my nephew, Alan - a less experienced caddy who doesn't go all that often, tell Tom this summer that he couldn't carry two bags or maybe that he couldn't go out a second time because his mom didn't want him to.  Alan is a little younger than Reggie.

My sons, inside their caddy-wired brains, silently screamed:  DON'T PLAY THE 'MY-MOMMY-SAID' CARD.  WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?  TOM KNOWS WE'RE RELATED, DON'T PULL THAT SHIT IF YOU'RE ASSOCIATED WITH US.  YOU'RE SOFT!

Reggie is not soft, BUT he is spoiled.  When Lad and Ed started caddying they didn't have phones.  They had to ask to use a landline in the bag room to call me when they were done.  And they waited.  Like, WAITED - for someone to pick them up because I was often busy.  They also sat in the caddy shack (learning a thing or two about stuff you don't tell your mother you just learned at the caddy shack) FOREVER waiting to get a loop.

Reg, on the other hand, has older siblings who drive to the course and are usually waiting to drive his ass home.  Reg often gets outstanding loops just because he's  associated with 'the family.'  He gets plugged into foursomes that the other siblings have been hand-picked to caddy in.  

Occasionally the older kids have to remind Reg of how fortunate he is.  In other words they tell him often, "Reg shut the ef up."

I pulled into the course in my not-so-conspicuous vehicle past the beautiful flowering member entrance.  Drove as close to the grassy section as I dared - farther away from where cars parked and dangerously close to the course - but crafty enough to NOT drive to the first tee like Tank did.  I hoped Tom would spot me.  

Silly me, EVERYONE spotted me.

Anyone noticing a theme here?

The caddies all look alike, but I was pretty sure I spotted Reggie approaching the first hole.  I hoped he was right, that Tom would show up.  I wondered if the older boys would be upset that Reg bothered Tom with a lunch pick-up request.  

In this text we see that young Reg has forgotten
the cardinal rule:  NEVER WAKE UP MOMMY.
Thankfully Curly knew better.

Suddenly out of nowhere, Tom's face appeared slightly below eye-level of the passenger window.  He was driving a cart. He reached his hand in the window to grab Reggie's meal-on-wheels.  I had never met him:  the man, the myth, the legend.  

Tom:  Mrs. Shenanigan?

Me:  Hi Tom.  So, caddy-masters do lunch delivery now?

Tom:  Oh, I do it all.  Thanks for bringing this for him.  

I watched him zip away, toss Reg his plastic bag lunch with one hand while giving a wave to the golfers with the other.  I assume he made a wise-ass remark about how he needs to feed his men.

I turned ole inconspicuous around in the parking lot  As I drove away, I could see that Reg already had half his sandwich shoved in his pie hole while balancing his bag on his opposite shoulder.  

The older brothers did give Reg a hard time, as anticipated, because of the lunch thing.  

And this is why I feel compelled to write a book about my life as the mother to a crowd of caddies.  **Imaging my readers eye-rolling:  "Feels like you already did with this lengthy piece." ** 

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Anyone with caddy blood in them? Has anyone ever known a caddy? Have you seen Caddy Shack?