Eye On The Birdie – Post #20 The Social Aspect Of Golf

Hello! I have reached my twentieth post! I think a milestone this large merits ice cream, but my mom would probably disagree. It’s too bad, because I really like ice cream. Anyway, this post will be about one of the reasons it is nice to be on the high school golf team. I will be writing about the friends I have made in my golf “career” (although not by name, of course). Last year I was also on the Farmington High School team (as you may already know), and it was wonderful. I made some friends, and it was also a great introduction to high school. This year, however, has been ten times better! Why? Partly because I know what everyone’s talking about. I must admit, I felt rather left out at times last year because I didn’t know what people were talking about. This year, I can join in more conversations because, for instance, I know what the dress code is or I saw that fight in the cafeteria. The biggest reason is because I have friends in multiple circles—I can relate to all the homework they got and discuss the latest tournament with them. Last year, I probably knew about four people well. This year, I’m close friends with at least six people and know practically everyone on the team by name. There’s even one boy who eats lunch with me because we have a class together and we’re both on the golf team. I also eat lunch with a girl who was on the team last year and her friends, and, unfortunately, she isn’t fond of him. However, she never gets upset with me for causing him to sit with us and he never leaves. That’s a minor dilemma I haven’t solved yet. It’s very puzzling. Teenagers don’t make sense—and I should know. I am one! Whoops, I really went off on a tangent there. Sorry. The golf team is practically its own society. Everyone knows at least one other person, so, in a roundabout way, everyone knows everyone else. Also, as Farmington is a rather small place, an amazing amount of people are related to other people. There’s one girl on the team who has actually discovered three relatives. None are related by blood, just by marriage, but it’s   still incredible. So, this girl knew she was step-siblings with one of the boys on the team. It turns out that one of her stepbrother’s relatives was married to another boy’s cousin, meaning all three of them were related. Later, it was discovered (by me and the girl) that the boy who eats lunch with me is cousins with her stepbrother and another random boy who is on the team. Therefore, this girl is, in some way or another, related to four of the boys on the team.  If that didn’t make sense to you, that’s fine. It doesn’t make much sense to me, either. Also, I used the term cousin kind of freely. I don’t know exactly how they are related to her. This is why I love being part of a sports team—I have more friends than I ever did before. It took me a while to learn how to find actual friends and not people who said they were my friends. I can be very naive at times, and have had “friends” who were either using me, trying to look good by having “friends,” or just making fun of me. I usually realize this has happened before two years have passed, but have been known to defend these people for up to four years. I have literally had this happen in every school setting I’ve ever been in, from preschool to home school to high school, but never on a golf team. I think it’s because when you’re on a sports team, even one where you play on your own, the members have to rely on each other to some extent, and people have to really know one another. People also seem to find it harder to hide who they are when they’re playing a game. It’s easy to tell who’s competitive, who’s pessimistic, who’s downright mean, and who’s simply playing to play. Of course, it’s also nice to just to get to play golf at least five times a week. The golf team is, hands down, my favorite part of high school. -Birdie