October 17, 2023
I’ve always admired the Ancient Greeks and their accomplishments. The fact that we know so much about the history of a civilization dating back to 1200 BC is staggering. As a writer, I think the longevity of their literature is especially astonishing. I have written a few stories that I’d just as soon forget, but there are one or two that I’m rooting for to make it into the hands of readers 3,000 years from now. But with my penchant for technological blunders, I’m sure I’ll accidentally delete them well before that.
The Greek myth with which I am most familiar is the tale of Icarus. Since two of my favorite bands, Kansas and Iron Maiden, both have songs based on the story, I researched the original tale many years ago. Daedalus and his son Icarus were imprisoned by King Minos in a large tower. It was a bad rap and they did not have a lawyer, so the father and son determined that escape was the best option. In a feat that would have made MacGyver jealous, Daedalus constructed two pairs of wings using feathers, threads from blankets, clothes, and beeswax.
As they were attaching the wings to their arms and getting ready for the breakout, Icarus said, “This is going to be awesome! I’ve always wanted to fly!”
But Daedalus had a warning for his son. “Yeah, flying is going to be cool. But don’t get too cocky up there. Flying too high can be problematic.”
Icarus dismissed his father with a wave of his hand and said, “Yeah. Okay.”
They jumped out of the tower and glided over the ocean. Everything was fine at first, but sure enough, Icarus got to feeling too good about himself—being the first non-god to fly. He did a couple barrel rolls, a stall turn, then a loop. Then he soared through some clouds until he was high above them and into the bright sunlight.
“I am a god!” he shouted.
Suddenly, the wings weren’t working so well. He noticed they were melting. At first, he cursed his dad for using beeswax, but then he realized, “Oh, man. He was right. I flew too high.”
As he fell toward the sea and passed Daedalus on the way down, he shrugged his shoulders and gave him the sheepish look of a kid that had just dented the family car.
The tale of Icarus comes up occasionally during golf games with Kyle and Quinn. The relevance is that golfers shouldn’t start feeling too full of themselves when they put together some pars and/or birdies. Fly too close to the sun on the golf course with a good stretch of holes and you might come crashing back down to earth—or the sea—with a string of bogies, double bogies, or worse.
This rarely applies to me since I’m usually nowhere near par for very long. But I was a couple of weeks ago playing with the boys at 5×80. We were playing for money again and I was winning almost every hole. I birdied two holes in a row at one point—that hardly ever happens—and I was briefly below par. I had a bogey or two, but avoided any big blow ups. As we were nearing the end of the front nine, I was trying not to think about my score, but I knew I was going to be in the neighborhood of my best nine holes ever. When I rolled in a long, twisting putt on the 9th hole for another birdie, I said out loud, “What have I done?!” But I already knew. I had a 36—even par—for the first time ever.
We use the term ‘megabonus’ to mean shooting under par for 18 holes. It’s our ultimate goal on the course. Every round, we’re all chasing the megabonus—until we’re not. On this particular round, with 36 on the front nine, the megabonus was still actually in play for me. Kyle was excited for me, pleased that at least one of us was making a run at it. Quinn didn’t really share his enthusiasm, having already lost some money to me. Me? I was playing as well as I ever had, but the thought of continuing that over 9 more holes wasn’t realistic. Like a Greek tragedy, my golf game always has some terrible event lurking. But I didn’t think it would happen so quickly.
I strode up to the first tee on the back 9 feeling no pressure at all. The megabonus, after all, was probably a bridge too far for me. I pushed my drive to the right into a group of trees. I hit the ball over there all the time, so I know it’s not the worst place to be. I found my ball and sized up my second shot. I had a couple big trees in front of me, but the shot was really no big deal. Just a normal swing with a pitching wedge and I’d be fine. But I chunked it, and the ball took a pitiful arc and came to rest about 40 yards away from me. I didn’t panic. This kind of thing happens to me all too frequently—it just hadn’t happened yet on this day.
My ball was behind a thick tree trunk. I sized up the shot and decided to play a low stinger just to the right of it. That’s not my favorite type of shot, but if I executed it, I felt I could still save a bogey. Quinn had an ominous tone when he offered the advice, “Be careful.”
I was not careful enough. I took an awkward swing, made horrible contact with the ball, it hit the trunk, ricocheted forward and low to the right, hit another big tree about 15 yards away, and came to rest behind it.
Quinn offered words that were half encouragement and half reprimand. “Come on now. Don’t fall apart on me.”
I had another tricky shot to execute. I had to hit the ball low enough to avoid the limbs of the tree I was under, but high enough to get it over the sand trap that was 20 yards in front of me. A high difficulty shot, indeed. “No problem,” I thought. I took a deep breath, a couple of quick practice swings, and skulled the ball into the trap.
I’m particularly bad at bunker shots, but the sand at 5×80 is usually wet and hard, so I can normally get the ball out, at least. But on my next shot, the ball hit the low lip and rolled back down into the sand. I was neither amused nor angry—just some weird place in between—as I got ready to swing my club for the 6th time. I got the ball out and onto the green and I hit two putts to finish. I reached in the hole for the ball, re-counted my shots in my head as I walked off the green, and announced, “8.”
I felt a little battered. The dream of the megabonus was gone. I got into the cart with Quinn and said, “I’m not sure what just happened. I’m super relaxed.”
Quinn said as we drove to the next hole, “You’re too relaxed right now.”
I let that sink in for a bit. He was absolutely right. I was playing it too cool. Part of the moral of the Icarus tale is ‘don’t be overconfident—don’t fly too high.’ But Daedalus also warned Icarus to avoid complacency by flying too low. On that Sunday morning at 5×80 on the 10th hole, in an effort to not singe my wings, I flew way too low. Instead of thinking, “The megabonus—why not me?”, I went in the opposite direction. By not embracing the challenge of the megabonus, I invited inevitable failure.
My mind was still cluttered as I played the next hole, and I got a double bogey. I’m pretty good at responding to a bad hole or bad few holes—since I have to do it so often—so I regained my mojo over the final 7. My final 18-hole score was still pretty good for me, but certainly anticlimactic given my stellar front 9. My big lead in the gambling mostly dissolved over the last half of the round, so we just called it even. I’m not sure if I’ll ever get a chance at the megabonus again, but if I do, I’m going to make sure to fly low enough to avoid melting the beeswax but high enough to not get hit with a rogue wave.
Earlham Echo 
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