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Seth Jones, senior associate editor, sjones@gcsaa.org |
When the real work begins
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“You’re out of luck,” Ricky Heine, CGCS, and GCSAA’s 71st president, told me during my visit to Texas last November to work on the profile of Heine that appears on page 48 of this issue of GCM. “Mr. Schroeder was in an accident. He’s not cooking the burgers today.”
We stepped into the rickety burger joint, and I had a look around. A poster-sized photo of a 21st birthday party celebrated in this location in 1964 hung on the wall. The jukebox, proudly displaying Roy Orbison’s greatest hits, looked like it hadn’t been updated since the mid-‘70s. The ceiling had a visible slant. Two 8-year-olds played “slap jack” with a deck of cards to entertain each other. Mr. and Mrs. Schroeder sat quietly in the middle of the restaurant, eager to welcome the next visitor. Mr. Schroeder, 85 years old with steel-grey eyes, smiled despite the halo he was wearing as a result of a broken neck sustained a week earlier.
I wasn’t “out of luck” at all. In fact, to be soaking up this experience on a sunny day in Texas this last November and calling it work? Very lucky indeed.
Prior to the burger joint — which served me one of the best cheeseburgers I’ve ever had, by the way — we had something of a quick tournament of champions at Heine’s house. We waited for Ricky’s oldest son, Jared, to arrive home from Texas A&M. Once he arrived, we sidestepped the pool table and the weight bench inside the Heine household, and instead headed for the three-acre yard.
It was there that the three of us faced off in a Heine sports trifecta — a long drive contest, football and fishing.
I got lucky to notch a win in the first event by catching Jared’s driver on the sweet spot to send a range ball far over the pond and into the woods (but in the opposite direction of Grandma’s house). Keeping it over the pond was vital, as everything else was out-of-bounds. Ricky eked out a win himself in the second long drive match.
In football, it was mano-a-mano, wide receiver vs. defensive back as the third person served as quarterback. A 100-yard hybrid bermudagrass field made it feel strangely real.
How serious is football in Texas? In this game, a father would accidentally dole out a bloody lip to his son during the first play from scrimmage. It still didn’t matter, as youth won out over both father and visiting journalist. Neither of us could score against Jared while we also were unable to keep him out of the end zone.
In the final event, fishing, no one even really cared. The bait was old. The competitors were out of breath. The fish were visible but not biting. But the sunset and the weather … catching a fish would only complicate such a beautiful evening.
And then, relaxing at Schroeder’s over a double cheeseburger and chips, I wondered how Heine, so lucky to have a beautiful wife and family with all this passion for sports and fun… I wondered how I’d be able to properly convey such zest in a story with simple words on paper. And I quickly put that thought out of my mind. Because that’s when the real work begins.
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