A Tribute To My Dad 2015
2015.12.24
My Dad's (that's him to the left at Pebble Beach) birthday is December 24th. It's kinda hard to have a real special birthday when that guy named Jesus also had one the next day every year. :) I gave this to my dad on Father's Day a number of years ago. Thanks Dad. Happy Birthday.
2015 Wally recently died. Was sad to hear but he lived a long life with plenty of fun.
How Me and Seve whooped Wally and the Barefoot Boy: A tribute to my father
It was a gorgeous early June day near the Rocky Mountain foothills. I enjoyed the crispness of the air, the lack of humidity and the southern big sky view from my back deck. I thought it made a great day for grilling and wanted something top of the line so I headed to Tony’s Specialty Meats. At Tony’s I looked through the glass at swordfish, crab, salmon and continued moving to my left to the beef. I saw the Filet Mignon. $14.99 per lb. I gasped.
In the early eighties, my dad and I used to win filets playing in golf tournaments in Boonville, Missouri. They came in boxes of twenty. You won four boxes per person for 1st, three for 2nd, two for 3rd, one for 4th and maybe a dozen balls for 5th. I gasped at the price of filets in Tony’s because my wife and I used to use those filets for stew meat! In our twenties, in our naiveté, we were living the high life in our little rented red house on a slab.
Usually the primary competition from Boonville consisted of Wally and the Barefoot Boy. Wally was a forty-something, portly, pear-shaped man who liked his bourbon and coke when he played. He was easy going with a fluid, smooth golf swing.
The Barefoot Boy was a little younger and taller and shoeless and scarier. He was about 6’5” and strong. Imagine Hulk Hogan, his Fu-Manchu, with brown hair and dark prescription sunglasses. That was the Barefoot Boy. The Barefoot Boy put the F-U in Fu-Manchu. His drink of choice was Miller beer in 8 oz., pony size bottles. At some point the men in Boonville got tired of getting their butts kicked by him on the golf course so they passed a rule that shoes had to be worn by all players. He got the thinnest pair of moccasins he could find and kept on playing. Wally and the Barefoot Boy were both generally good company to tour the greens.
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