Steve Christilaw: A tale of many good walks spoiled

One of the fun things about moving all of your belongings into a new home is that you find all kinds of things that you’d forgotten about.

Like those golf clubs I stashed in the old garage and that have been sitting in storage now for a couple years.

I haven’t missed them.

Golf and I have a love-hate relationship. Well, not exactly hate. It’s more of a love-intense indifference kind of thing. I love the IDEA of golf; when it comes to actually playing the game, my enthusiasm evaporates.

I love reading about the game. I grew up reading Dan Jenkins’ work in Sports Illustrated and later his columns in Golf Digest. Most of his collected writings have a special spot in my library, along with Jack Nicklaus’ instruction books, Arnold Palmer’s “Complete Book of Putting” and Harvey Penick’s “Little Red Book.”

When I tune in to watch the final round of a major, I marvel at how few golfers I actually know. Most times, the list begins and ends with Phil Mickelson.

The greats I grew up watching have all retired. Mention Arnie’s Army or Lee’s Fleas to most fans and they’ll look at you like you’ve spent too many long hours trying to get out of a sand trap.

When it comes to playing the game, the title of John Feinstein’s book “A Good Walk Spoiled” just about sums it all up.

If everyone played the game the way I do, there would be no need to ever mow the fairway. My ball never lands there.

Let me put it this way: I have always considered par to be just a suggestion.

I could swear there have been times when trees and bushes and ponds have literally jumped in the way of where I’ve hit the ball.

I don’t need a caddy. I need a Sherpa guide with a GPS tracker and an Uber account to get me back on the fairway. I once asked Siri where my golf ball was and she directed me to the pro shop for a new box of Top-Flites.

When my ball finally falls into the cup, you can hear it sigh and say “finally.”

Yes, I have broken 100 a time or two. But we inevitably play the back nine and there goes my score.

On the back nine at Liberty Lake, the marmots go onto spasms of laughter whenever I hit an approach shot. And at Qualchan my playing partners have long since stopped shouting “Fore!” Instead they scream “Duck! Duck, goose!”

If I could have thrown a baseball with as much break on it as one of my tee shots, I would have had a Hall of Fame career in the major leagues.

With one exception.

I once wrote a story about a golf teacher with a new approach to the golf swing. We met to talk about it and he offered to demonstrate his new approach to me on the driving range.

The first step was for me to step into the tee box and hit a few so that he could see what I laughingly call my golf swing.

For a guy who can easily hit a ball around a 90-degree corner on most days, for some reason my sample shots all went straight as an arrow for more than 300 yards. Down the middle of the fairway – boldly going where none of my golf shots had gone before.

Technology has brought a great deal to the game of golf in my lifetime.

The Mike Souchak-autographed MacGregor clubs I started out swinging back in the day are now a museum piece. And the first-generation Pings I still use don’t have a lot in common with today’s golf clubs.

They say that the modern golf ball is a technological marvel as well. I wouldn’t know. I’ve never hit one more than a time or two before they’ve found their way into the piney woods for good and all.

And now there’s a whole new technology that’s revolutionizing the game: The Cloud.

Today’s professionals can enter all the analytics they want into a computer and use that data to break down and strategize their game plan for a given golf course.

Just what I need: profound frustration in virtual reality.