An American Caddie in St. Andrews: Growing Up, Girls, and Looping on the Old Course

by Oliver Horovitz

  It is six P.M., Paris time, when our plane skids into Paris Beauvais Tille Airport. This should really just be called “Beauvais Tille Airport,” since we’re still fifty-five miles outside Paris. Muttering this to myself, I gather my backpack and switch to yet another bus for the hour-and-a-half ride into Paris proper. Before long though, the Truffaut skyline of elegant apartment buildings magically appears, with the Eiffel Tower spearing the sky above. We’re passing cafés and tree-lined streets, and people wearing motorcycle helmets and Hermès scarves. People who hold unlit cigarettes in their hands before they even step outside. People who have never tasted haggis. I watch skinny, well-coiffed Parisians commuting from their offices on 1950s Vespa scooters. It seems inconceivable that Paris and St. Andrews could share the same planet.

  We pull into Porte Maillot. I hop off the bus as my cell phone buzzes. It’s an earlier missed call—from the caddie shack. I don’t check the voice mail. I did eight spins this week. Rick Mackenzie can wait till after the weekend. I hop on the metro, ride the four stops to Sylvie’s apartment. It’s a warm summer evening in the city. I buy a Pariscope (speaking in French). I buy a crêpe (speaking in French). I accidentally stumble into an old woman, who screams at me (speaking in, I think, Turkish). It’s nice being back in Paris. It’s more than nice, actually. It feels like the center of the world. It feels right. I call Sylvie, arrange to meet her outside her apartment. There’s a party at her friend’s house we’re going to tonight. Then everyone’s heading to some restaurant in the Marais. I race the final few blocks to Sylvie’s apartment. It’s going to be a perfect weekend. Tomorrow, we’ll revisit my old neighborhood again, and walk in the Jardin du Luxembourg, where the kids ride the merry-go-round, and we’ll visit the Picasso Museum, and holy shit, I am so unbelievably happy.

  • • •

  Tonight, my first night in Paris, Sylvie breaks up with me.

  “Wait, what?” I’m pacing back and forth outside the restaurant.

  “Something is missing,” Sylvie says. She’s sitting on the curb of the side street, clutching her knees. And killing me.

  “I don’t . . . You’ve got to be kidding.”

  “Can’t you see that this is hard for me?”

  “Oh yeah, brutal. Couldn’t you have told me this, like, on the phone, before I flew over here?” I’m trying to keep it together. All of Sylvie’s friends are inside, except for two girls who are waiting across the street, watching. This is playing out like a corny French film. Except it was never supposed to be funny.

  “I’m really sorry,” Sylvie says. “I really wanted this to work—”

  “Yeah, me too! That’s kind of why I came over here!” Everything I’ve felt good about this summer, everything I looked forward to, it’s all crumbling in front of my eyes. I’m trying not to cry. “Sylvie, I could stay here . . . I could move here this summer. Isn’t there some way we could—”

  “No. Oliver. Please. I’m sorry. I’m—”

  I’ve heard enough. I start walking away. And then I start running. And then I start really running. This couldn’t be less brave, but I don’t know how to deal with what I’m feeling, and I don’t care. I feel like I’ve just been punched in the stomach. I feel like this city has just ripped my guts out. I feel like the biggest loser in the world. Suddenly I’m alone and far from home, and all I want to do is be back in St. Andrews.

  • • •

  The rest of the weekend plays out much in the way that it might if your girlfriend dumped you . . . and then you still had to stay at her apartment for two more nights. Which is to say, unbelievably uncomfortably.

  “Do you have a, uh, extra pillow?”

  I’m at Sylvie’s apartment now. I’ve been put in the spare room.

  “Yes. There ees one behind the dohr.” Sylvie is calling from the other room.

  “Uh-huh, right . . . behind this far door?”

  “No, the other dohr.”

  “Wait, what?”

  “The other one.”

  “There’s another door?”

  “Oui!”

  I pause for a few deep breaths.

  “I’m sorry, I really don’t see another door.”

  More sounds of motorcycles and Vespas outside. All I want to do is turn the light out—to end this day. The last thing I want to do is have another conversation. An accordion starts playing from somewhere. It’s an Edith Piaf song. Are you fucking kidding me?

  “What are you doing tomorrow?” Sylvie asks.

  “What am I doing? I dunno . . . I guess I’ll just go for a walk or something.”

  “Maybe you could go to a museum.”

  “Yeah, maybe.”

  I’m in the world’s most romantic city. And the girl who just dumped me is suggesting trip itineraries.

  • • •

  After a lot of lengthy silences, Sunday arrives, and I have to make the turn for home. Sylvie gives me a hug at the door.

  “I’m sorry, Oliver. Really. I’m really sorry.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Thank you for coming to Paris.”

  “Yeah, it was really special . . .”

  * * *

  On ScotRail’s train service back from Edinburgh to St. Andrews, with the Paris Vespas and the cafés a fading memory, I hide myself in an Ernest Hemingway book (The Sun Also Rises) and miss my train stop. I have to catch a bus from Dundee at midnight. The girl in front of me throws up on the bus. Two guys behind me start having a fistfight. Overall, this is not the weekend I had dreamed it would be.

  FIFTY

  Back in St. Andrews, I can’t get Sylvie off my mind. The weekend in Paris is still on auto-loop in my head. Could I have done something differently? Could I have acted more mature? Was my final parting line as the door shut (“By the way, thanks a lot”) a little much?

  I’m still wondering what I did wrong as I sign in at the shack this morning. Rick’s kindly assistant, Ken, is at the window. He’s got some interesting news.

  “There’s a job for qualifying in the Women’s British Open if you want it, Ollie.”

  This snaps me back to reality. “Really?”

  “Yep. She’s a Welsh girl. Lydia Hall. Playing a practice round on Sunday, then qualifying Monday. Do you want the bag?”

  This is crazy. The Women’s British Open is coming to town—and it’s being held on the Old Course for the first time in history. Swooping in will be Annika Sörenstam, Karrie Webb, Michelle Wie, Paula Creamer, Natalie Gulbis. Now, if this girl makes it through the qualifier, I’ll be caddying in a major championship.

  I nod back as casually as possible. “Sure, that sounds good.” When I’m out of sight of the window, I do a huge leap in the air. I’ve got a bag. And who knows, Lydia could be the love of my life.

  * * *

  The Women’s British Open final qualifier is being held in six days. It’s an eighteen-hole event. One hundred twenty ladies gunning for twenty-one spots. These odds are, as golf qualifiers go, remarkably good ones. Sure, the one hundred twenty will include ninety pros among the amateurs, most of them regulars on the Ladies European Tour, but one hundred twenty for twenty-one spots is still in a different cosmos from the Monday qualifiers on the PGA Tour I’ve read about, where two hundred people will play for one or two spots, max. This Sunday, it’s eighteen good holes, and you’re in. Eighteen holes, and it’s Michelle Wie, Annika Sörenstam, and Paula Creamer. Even cooler, the qualifier is being held on the New Course—a track I’ve played close to a thousand times.

  I take stock of the situation. I’ve got the rest of this week before Lydia gets into town. If I caddie nonstop for the week, I’ll try to get myself into “tournament caddie shape” for the qualifier—whatever the hell that means. I’ll ask the shack to put me on the New Course as much as possible. I’ll prepare as best I can. It’ll be the perfect distraction from Sylvie. I walk back into the shack to grab a coffee, feeling better already. I’ve got new women in my life now. The Women’s British Open is coming to town. I want in.r />
  FIFTY-ONE

  Uncle Ken has a helper this year. Her name’s Rina, a sixty-year-old St. Andrean with an overcast face who comes to check in on him every day at five o’clock. This service was set up through Ninewells Hospital, after Uncle Ken’s fall in November. Rina helps Uncle Ken with the shopping, makes sure he’s got everything he needs. I think Uncle Ken kind of likes this, being told what to do. It’s a throwback to his old military days.

  “Rina said that I must do these exercises, you see!”

  I’m over at Uncle Ken’s now. As usual, my uncle wanted to see me but invented a more practical reason for me to come over (“You know, I could really use a little help with the marigolds . . .”). We’re in his kitchen now, and he’s just begun doing some funny little exercise moves.

  “The doctor gave me a list in November, you see, and Rina is very strict about my doing them!”

  My tiny eighty-six-year-old uncle now has both hands on hips and is doing some funny hula-hoop-style twirls, like a cheerleader.

  “Hold it! Hold it! One more set!”

  I didn’t do anything to warrant the “hold it,” but I don’t ask questions. My uncle puts one hand on his sink counter and now does some mini leg swings—counting out the reps to himself very seriously. “Six . . . seven . . . eight . . . two more!” Uncle Ken is in the zone.

  After the exercises wrap up, we troop out together into the garden. In the late-afternoon sunshine, I dig holes by the back wall for the green beans. I plant a set of marigolds in the center display. I dig up weeds around the flower beds. I deadhead roses. I water the pansies. It’s rather grueling work, and I muddy up all my clothes, but it all seems to really please Uncle Ken. As I work, he potters around, occasionally remarking, “Oh, this is excellent, Oliver!” After a while, I decide to share my news.

  “You know, Uncle Ken, I’ve got a bag for the women’s Open qualifier.”

  “You do? Oh, that’s super! Oh, I’m very pleased about that, you know!”

  “Yeah, it’s this Sunday. Eighteen holes on the New Course.”

  “Oh, excellent!”

  Uncle Ken is obviously excited. I return to my work—packing white daisies into wet soil. I’m working harder than usual, I notice. A little more earnestly. I think it’s my way of dealing with what’s around me. As if by doing that one extra deadhead, I can slow down time. Because seeing Uncle Ken with his cane, seeing the extra fall-prevention precautions around the house, seeing the way in which my uncle walks and talks just that little bit slower, is scaring me. It’s as if our body clock is always waiting to play catch-up. That if you defy it, and take care of yourself, and keep yourself young, it’s always lurking, looking to reel you in. One fall can do it. One fall has done it. Because I hate to admit it, but with his fall last year, my uncle seems to have just added fifteen years onto his age.

  “Are you sorted for dinner tonight, Oliver?”

  I turn to my uncle. “Aren’t we having dinner together at the Grill House?”

  “Well, I’d like to, you know, but I’m feeling a little bit under the weather . . .”

  “Oh yeah, don’t worry about me—I’ve got pasta and cheese at home,” I say as brightly as possible.

  “Oh good!”

  Uncle Ken seems relieved. But I’m not. Uncle Ken and I have had dinner together at the Grill House virtually every week I’ve ever spent in St. Andrews. When my uncle passes on dinner at the Grill House, I know something has changed.

  FIFTY-TWO

  Lydia Hall. Nineteen years old. From Pencoed, Wales.

  I’m Googling Lydia. And, wow, she seems good.

  I scroll down the page of a Welsh amateur Web site, scanning a selection of her tournament results.

  Top qualifier—British Girls’ championship.

  Silver medal—European Under-21 championship.

  Winner—Glamorgan Ladies’ championship.

  I let out a little caddie shout.

  “Foaaahhhh!”

  • • •

  It’s 4:40 P.M., and I’ve just finished another qualifier-prepping round on the New Course. There are only three more days left, and I’m feeling ready. I’m also feeling ready for bed, as I head into the shack, to collect my bag. Rick is there, waiting. He has alternative plans.

  “Mmmm . . . Ollie, I’m going to need you to go again,” Rick says, pointing outside as if ordering a misbehaving dog to a kennel. “You’re on the tee right now.”

  I wince, tell Rick, “Okay” (how can I say no?), and stagger back outside, where I find Randall Morrison putting on his bib.

  “Rick said it’s a very VIP job,” Randall announces.

  “Great.”

  My pulse doesn’t exactly quicken. Rick promises this kind of round frequently, and it usually just means “I need you to fill this job, so you’re going again.”

  Today, though, Rick isn’t kidding. We go to meet the golfers. In our group is the son of Tony Lema—the mega-tall American golfer who was immortalized by winning the 1964 British Open, in his first-ever St. Andrews appearance. Tragically, “Champagne Tony” (so nicknamed because he used to buy bottles of champagne for all the media) was killed in a plane crash, just two years later, at the age of thirty-two, leaving behind his only son . . . who is now forty-five, making practice swings next to me on the first tee.

  David Lema is a spitting image of his father. He’s tall as a tower and stern as a stone. “I come here every five years to play the Old,” he tells me and Randall. David’s here with two friends from Las Vegas. All are 2-handicaps. All are serious golfers. And, I note, being the son of a former Open champion has its benefits. Members of the R & A come out to shake his hand before we tee off. The starter in the hut gives him a warm hello. Lema’s friend, for whom I’m caddying, tells me midway down the first fairway, “Having David’s father be who he was, it’s opened a lot of doors for us.”

  Randall and I have to work hard on this round. The men are demanding. They’re used to the best. But I don’t mind. I like being tested out here. And right now, I like being alongside David Lema.

  David was four years old when his father was killed—just two years old when his father won here. The legend of his father and that epic win at St. Andrews—these are the shadows in which David lives his life. As we play, the tall American doesn’t say much. But he’s observant, thoughtful. It’s as if, by playing the Old, treading on the same grass that Tony Lema trod forty-three years ago, David is trying to discover the dad he never knew.

  Darkness is descending on St. Andrews as we walk up 18. My guy’s hit an approach shot to the back of the green, and David’s hit his wedge to twenty feet. As we walk, I can see David staring up the edges of the fairway. I wonder if he’s imagining what it was like for his dad on this final walk up the eighteenth. Crowds cheering. Tip Anderson beside him. Roars echoing from behind the green—roars that I always dreamed of hearing for myself, roars that I’m sure David has dreamed of too.

  It’s pitch-dark when David Lema stands over his putt, on the same green on which his father won. I’m not sure what it is, but this green always makes you think of the past. The way it sits at the edge of town—the history behind it. Something about this green always makes it seem, I dunno, like a platform from which you can touch the past. David takes a deep breath and strokes the putt. The ball skids up the left, takes the break, slides right. It slams in. Birdie. A birdie on 18 at St. Andrews. Everyone in our group breaks into cheers. And then, without warning, Champagne Tony Lema’s son looks up, and screams out into the darkness, at the top of his lungs, “I LOVE YOU, DAD!”

  The shout rings out into the night, booms up into the sky, catches us totally off guard.

  There are chills down my spine.

  FIFTY-THREE

  Ricoh, the office supplies manufacturer, is this year’s sponsor of the Women’s British Open. And the fact that the Old Course suddenly looks like a stationery store means that championship week is approaching. It’s Saturday, two days before the Monday qualifi
er, and already, most of the grandstands, TV towers, and bright red Ricoh scoreboards are in place (one of the scoreboards has its letters set out already, which someone has used to write the message CADDIE TIPS START AT 70). Out on the course, the greens are being rolled, the tee boxes watered, pitch marks repaired. Everything’s getting ready.

  I’m on the third hole of the New Course, scouting pins and calculating run-outs from the tournament tees, when Lydia calls.

  Actually, it’s Rob from the shack who phones me. “I’ve got a job back at the Links Clubhouse for you,” he says.

  I’m stunned. I can’t believe Rob’s sending me out with a potential 27-handicapper. “I can’t do it, Rob, I have to pace out all the yardages for Monday!” I say.

  “Well, can’t you do both at the same time?” Rob sounds confused. He’s obviously not hearing me.

  “Sorry, Rob, I’m too busy,” I say firmly.

  There’s a lengthy pause on the other end before Rob says, “Okay, I’ll just tell Lydia you can’t do it.”

  It’s Lydia Hall. My golfer. Shit. “Oh! No, wait! Wait! No, I’m coming!” I yell, then sprint back the wrong way down the course, to the Links Clubhouse. It’s swarming with female golfers, coaches, caddies, and tense-looking family members. Amid the swarm, I spot Greaves and McGinley. Both have bags for final qualifying. Both look excited. I hurry over to the front desk, where I’m shown to a young-looking girl in a black rain suit.