I had almost given up on the idea of ever making a hole-in-one. Then everything changed on July 14th, 2024. My dad had passed away the previous November and I had spent the last 8 months traveling back and forth from Nashville to help care for my mom. She has terminal cancer and my dad was her primary care giver. It's been an emotional and stressful time to say the least. Haven't played a lot of golf this year because of all that's been going on, so my game has been absolute dog crap. So on Saturday, July 14th, I'm playing our usual weekend match at our club with a great group of guys. I make par on hole 1. Then it's time to play my nemesis hole. A downhill par 3 that measures 191 from the blue tees. Tiny green, bunkers on the left and right. Over the 8 years I've been a member at this great little gem of a course I'd say I'm in the right bunker about 80% of the time, the left bunker about 19% of the time, and hit and stay on the green about 1% of the time. That's how tough this hole has been on me. Recently I'd decided to club up from a my 4 hybrid to my 3 wood (I don't hit it very long) because it gave me a better shot of reaching the green, even if it rolled through (which it consistently did). I figured I'd rather chip from behind the green and have a better shot a making par than trying to hit out of a bunker and not really have as much control. I flushed my shot. The whole group is tracking it. It's going right at the pin but we all lose sight of it just before reaching the green. It was early in the morning and hot and muggy and we're all old and can't see anymore so... no idea where the ball is but I knew where it was: it was over the green and I was going to have to pitch it close. Well as we're walking down from the tee and getting close to the green, Paul (who organizes these wonderful weekend matches) says to me 'That ball might be in the hole'!!! To which I reply, 'Paul, it's over the green'. As we're walking around the right side of the green, he on his way to his ball in the bunker and me on my way to the back of the green to find my ball, he says, 'I'm just gonna look in the cup. That ball could be in the cup'!! Yeah, ok Paul, I'm thinking to myself. Well no sooner had he made his way to the cup and looked in that he screams 'HOLE IN ONE!!! HOLE IN ONE!!!' I was in shock. I literally could not believe what I was hearing. My head was spinning. I think I put my hands over my head and hollered... I don't know. I immediately started thinking about my beloved father, who taught me this wonderful, crazy game for all of us sicko's who love to torture ourselves, and got really emotional. That was the part that caught me off guard. Word spread quickly on the course. Guys were congratulating me and giving me big, sweaty hugs. Did I mention it was hot? And really, really muggy??? What a day. A day I'll never forget. And to make it that much sweeter... there's a bit more. As I said, the past 8 months I have been helping care for my mom, but it's been a lot more than that. I've really devoted all my energy into finding her a safe place to live. It was clear early on that she needed to be in an Assisted Living situation because none of us were capable of giving her the care she needed. This created an enormous amount of stress and guilt. We just couldn't imagine having to do this with our mom. And we were totally lost. Had no idea where to turn. We were really fortunate to find a wonderful team that specialized in helping families in the very situation and found a fantastic place for her. She had just been settled a little over a week when I had this hole in one. And in the parking lot after the round, as I'm writing on my Titleist Pro V1 these words: "Hole In One 7/14/24" I realize it's her birthday. What a day. What a glorious day.