For some of us, a passion starts at a very early age. And so does a talent.

I wonder, though, how often the passion and the talent aren’t for the same thing?

I’ve talked before about my son, Colin — it was his observation to me three years ago that led me to start this blog (and inspired its title). Our conversations over his life have given me things to thing about, like whether “schmooze” is an actual leadership style.

Colin is the youngest of TJ’s and my four sons. He and Graham were born during our Tour years and they’ve grown up around golf courses. Unlike several of the Tour kids of their generation, they didn’t grow up to have careers in golf. But all of them have a natural talent for the game.

Talent + passion. Or not.

I think it was my oldest son, Matt, who once said that he thought Colin had the most natural talent of all four of them. There have been times when the boys played together for the first time in a season and Colin — not having touched a club for a year — ended up beating all of them. They hate that when it happens. Good-natured ragging goes on.

When Colin was about 11, he played in his first sub-junior district tournament (his only sub-junior tournament). Unlike Graham, who wrote about his competitive thoughts while playing in the same tournament, Colin’s style was completely “hang loose.”

I walked around with Colin in his first match. This was played on the same course where his dad had won the NY State Amateur at 19 — Locust Hill Country Club in Rochester, NY.

Parents were allowed to walk around with their kid, but not to give any coaching or tips — which was a good thing, because I had none to give as a non-golfer.

Here’s where we come to the diverging path between passion and talent.

Colin has had a passion for nature, wildlife, fish and the environment since he was just a Kindergartener. As we walked around from shot to shot, Colin would often be paying more attention to the birds, or the fish in the ponds than whether it was his turn to hit. In fact, he’d have to be reminded by one of the parents of his competition (or by me) that he was up.

At one tee, he wandered toward the adjacent woods while his opponent took his tee shot.

“Colin, it’s your turn,” I reminded him.

He pointed toward some bushes. “Look, Mom. There’s a rabbit.” I don’t think he even heard me when I said it was his turn. His focus was completely on the nature he observed.

“Colin!” the parents called. I think they were getting a bit peeved.

Colin walked up to the tee, and without taking a practice swing, striped it down the middle of the fairway.

The dads shook their heads. They said they envied his relaxed state.

I tried to split my time between walking with Colin and with Graham, who was playing his own match at the same time in a very different “state”.

Colin and Graham both won their morning matches. When I joined Colin before his round in the afternoon, he had — in the true style of a kid whose dad played on the Tour — “hired” himself a 12 year old caddie, one of the boys who had lost his match in the morning.

I think I should also mention that Colin was wearing one of his dad’s size XL golf shirts — XL has become the “universal golf shirt size” of the Diehl men. It bagged around his 11 year old body like a sail. He also wore one of the gazillion golf visors that resided in our house. It was like someone had hit a Tour player with a shrinking ray or made a golf-version of the movie “Big.”

So Colin’s passion (the natural world) never interfered with his talent on the course. He ended up winning his division and getting his picture in the paper.

Maybe his passion helped him win. In turning his attention away from competing, he allowed his natural talent to flow. He really didn’t care whether he won or not. It just happened.

Though they come from the same genes, each one of the “the boys” is an individual with a different nature, which serves them for good or ill on the golf course.

And like each one of us, they all have natural talents and their own passions.

Colin is now a wildlife biologist and environmental scientist. That’s where his talent and passion meet.

I have a talent for drawing, sculpture and art, but I never had the passion for it. Fortunately, I do have both the talent and passion for writing.

How about you? Do you have a passion for something, but your talent lies elsewhere? Have your passion and talent aligned? And how much does your nature — laid back, competitive, whatever — serve or hinder your talent?

You’re looking at the next generation of Diehl golfers. What will his game hold?

This is Nate. Last summer, daddy Graham (#3 in the Diehl Boys lineup) took his boy out for the first time on a golf course. Nate is 6 1/2 and he loves to play sports. I imagine that what was most exciting and special was getting to go with his dad — just the two of them — to a golf course. Nate knows daddy has a lot of fun playing golf with friends and of course, with Nate’s uncles and Grandpa Terry.

I think this course in the picture is a little mom ‘n pop course. Not much traffic, a place where it’s OK to take a little one out without disturbing anyone.

That’s quite a difference from how Graham learned to play golf and where he hit balls in a lineup with his brothers at the driving range at Oak Hill. When TJ was home on a break from the Tour, he’d take all four boys out to Oak Hill and get them two buckets of balls to hit. Graham was just a little guy. TJ gave them little tips and never pushed – we got a kick out of watching them.

Each of the boys has talent. Even back then, ranging in age from about 12 to 4 years old, they had a natural sense of what to do with a golf club. And their emotional games were already forming.

Graham was intent and serious, even as a kid.

(Colin, the youngest, used to swing so hard that he’d sometimes spin off his feet and fall on his butt. Or he’d be busy playing with the range balls. Hey, he was just a little guy.)

Graham went about hitting balls like the student he was. By the time he was 13, he played his first district golf tournament in the sub-junior division. It isn’t that his brothers didn’t play in tournaments, too. But Graham was the one who wrote about it in an essay in high school.

I just found that essay today. It was in an art folder stored in my attic. There on the page was a description of his mental game.

“As I waited on the first tee, I was extremely nervous,” he wrote. He was the youngest of 5 kids representing Bristol Harbour Golf Club at the qualifier [TJ was president of the club at the time and the boys spent a lot of time at the course]. He ended up shooting a 91 (45-46) and was the only one to make the cut.

(By the way, this was played at Locust Hill Golf Club — the site of the Wegmans LPGA Championship.)

That boosted his confidence. The next day, he moved to match play.

“I wasn’t as nervous because I had a different attitude, since I realized that I could compete with all these other kids,” he says in the essay. “Besides that [ -- and here's what kills me, the seriousness of it --] my dad gave me a few new swing thoughts.”

His game was up and down, “good on one hole, horrible the next.” He was winning by one hole on the 18th hole. Then he hit “a growling slice into the woods. I was in a difficult position.” He lost the hole. They tied and went into a sudden death playoff.

Graham moved on to the semi-finals. He sized up his opponent:

There was no way I could lose. I had a good 6″ and 40lbs on him. He teed up and hit his shot about 175 yards down the middle of the short par 5. I felt like laughing after I crushed my shot about 250 yards down the right side of the fairway. I lost the hole after a bad second shot, but I was extremely pumped; in fact, a little too pumped. I hit my second shot over the green every time and when I got onto the green, I kept putting about three feet by the hole. I was getting very frustrated. I was about to snap all my shafts. On the 10th hole, I was 8 holes down, but began to play better, although I was still struggling.

Here’s where it gets good: Then my mom came to watch me on about the 13th hole… My mom was cooling me down. I took a deep breath and remembered everything my dad taught me about chipping…

… I love that part….

He kept winning holes and had to win all three of the last 3 holes to win the match. They ended up tying the last hole. The other boy won the match.

We shook hands and walked back to the clubhouse together. I don’t know how I kept my cool… I couldn’t believe I lost to this kid. I guess I was really mad at myself for getting so cocky and then angry. Next time I’m just going to play against myself. I mean by this, thinking about every shot before I hit it and not what I have to do to win.

The good news is, he came away proud of himself. It was the first tournament of his life and he made it to the top eight in Rochester.

What Graham didn’t write was that he eventually asked me not to watch him. He was getting too upset in the match and wanted to struggle on alone. I honored his feelings — I’d had long practice in reading a player’s emotions during a round. Besides, Colin was playing at the same time in the tournament in a younger division — and that’s a whole other story I can’t wait to tell you. Talk about differences in temperaments!

So anyway… I did edit out a comment Graham made about what he really wanted to do to his opponent as they walked back to the clubhouse. I could just see Graham — he might be seething inside, but he would be composed and even-tempered on the outside, being a gentleman. Even at 13. That’s pretty much his temperament. And he has a wicked sense of humor.

Whether Nate has the talent that his dad and his uncles seemed to be born with is still to be discovered. And who cares, anyway? What’s important is that Nate gets the chance to have fun with his dad and be able to share experiences. And so far, we have two little Diehl girls coming up in the ranks — who knows if one of them is carrying “the golfing gene”. Maya, at 4, has been asking her dad Matt if he’ll take her to the course.

They definitely didn’t get that gene from me.

By the way — I didn’t edit Graham’s words. All my boys are very good writers. I like to think there’s a genetic link there. Ahem.

Maybe the lesson here is that it doesn’t matter what genes you inherit, as long as you enjoy the gifts they bring.

This is my son, John, and my daughter-in-law, Trina, on their wedding day in Kalispell, Montana. I’m missing them so much tonight.

Well, every night, really.

It’s hard to have one of my boys — a piece of my “Magic Circle” as John once described his brothers and me — clear across the country. It’s what mothers feel so deeply, like a quiet little ache, no matter how old a kid gets. I think about him all the time, wondering how his day is going as a craftsman stonemason on some of the most spectacular homes in Montana’s Flathead Valley.

Trina’s brother, PGA professional Dane Thorman, became my “Montana Son” when we all went out for John’s wedding in 2007. We loved Dane right away. Dane teaches at the beautiful Fazio-designed Iron Horse Golf Club in Whitefish, Montana..

So Dane and I are friends on Facebook. And the other day, he posted two photos of guys playing at Iron Horse, and I liked this one especially:

That’s what I call rough!

Of course, Iron Horse actually has holes like this one:

That’s Whitefish Lake in the background.

When we went out to Montana as a family, I fell in love with it. And I haven’t stopped missing Montana ever since, not just because John is there, but because… well, that particular part of Montana truly rates the description “Breathtaking.” We stayed at the Hidden Moose Lodge along Whitefish Lake and when we weren’t going to wedding events like the rehearsal dinner at Whitefish Golf Club or taking a Walk in the Cedars in Glacier National Park, we were in Whitefish every day, shopping and eating. We even went birthday shopping at the Farmer’s Market just opposite Whitefish’s famous train station.

It was the perfect trip — being together, perfect weather, surrounded by the mountains, discovering the charms of a piece of country where God must come to relax.

One of the incredible streams running through A Walk in the Cedars

The boys got to play some golf, of course. They played with their dad and they played as part of the bachelor party. Our golfing family expanded by two — Trina is my serious golfer, representing her non-playing sisters-in-law, and me, of course. (I’ll never forget when John, falling in love with Trina, told me, “I never thought I could have so much fun playing golf with a girl!” He has his dad’s competitive nature, so I knew this was serious.)

Whitefish is actually more of huge winter/skiing/boarding destination. And last winter, John and Trina went to a winter event I’d never heard of until then — ski-joring, cowboy style. Skiers are pulled around a course (they do this in Finland with reindeer) and I think the fastest run wins.

So tonight, missing my boy, I went on the Whitefish website, wishing I could get out there and sit by the fire with my lovies in their rambling old house. There’s so much more to tell about Kalispell, the homes he helps build, and our wonderful 10 days as a family in such a friendly and majestic place. But for now, I’ll just enjoy this quintessential Montana song by David Walburn — You gotta hear this: Meat’s in the Freezer (Let’s Go Skiing)

How can you NOT love a place with that sense of humor?

You’re looking at a phenomenon.

Mariam Kobras’ first novel of a 40 year old rock star who reunites with his lost love (and the mother of his son) sold out on Amazon before its official launch. It’s rapidly caught fire and selling well in several countries. And Kobras had never written fiction – or written much — before she decided to create a story for herself, not necessarily for publication.

This almost never happens.

With that sort of success, you’d think she’d be — well, unapproachable. Elite. But, no. Mariam, as I’ve come to know her, is one of the most down to earth, sweetest and gifted people I’ve come across. The thing is, she lives in Germany, I live in the States and the only way we’ve gotten to know each other is connecting every day — can it be a year now?? — over Twitter. But it’s in writing those tweets and then emails, that we find the common ground as writers. We speak each other’s language — of the mind and heart.

So when she asked me be one of the hosts for her publicity “blog hop” — I didn’t hesitate. Here’s my interview. This is Mariam. Watch for her, readers.

I’m struck by how much we have in common even after reading your first blog interview with PJ Kaiser! Like you, I’ve always wanted to publish my novel “traditionally.” We both love the feel of a book in our hands. This makes me think you’re a long-time reader. Can you tell us a bit more about your relationship with books? What do you like read?

Among the many books I’ve read, a few stick out that I love. They are kept on a shelf very close to my favorite spot in the living room so they are always within reach. Some of them (in no particular order) are Nagib Machfus’ Cairo Trilogy, Vikram Seth’s A Suitable Boy, Sigrid Undset’s Kristin Lavransdottir, Sean Jeter Naslund’s Ahab’s Wife, John Galsworthy’s Forsyte Saga, John Irving’s Owen Meany and Kiana Davenport’s Shark Dialogues. These are close to my heart.

I’m a bit quirky about books. I need to own them, and in paper too. Preferably in hardcover. I’ve gone out a number of times to buy a hardcover book after buying and reading the paperback. It’s a calamity that beautiful, bound books are being forced out of the market by the e-book rage. I fear that later generations will never feel the awe of holding something as precious as the Gutenberg Bible in their hands.

I wonder if book readings and signings will go out of fashion with the advent of the e-book, and what will that do to the author–reader relationship?

As an author, I really love talking to my readers. It’s so cool to hear their views about my books. Sometimes it’s something completely different than what I meant. All that feedback, all that personal contact, will it die?
As you can see, I’m not a fan of e-books. Reading a book on a Kindle is pretty much like watching a rock concert on TV.

I read that you had a scene in your mind – the reappearance of a long-lost love and a woman dropping a tray of glasses to the floor…and the reunion reignites that lost love instantly. I also had a scene that presented itself to me in writing my novel – a young waiter singing brilliantly on a terrace in Italy, trying to impress a girl among the diners. Was The Distant Shore built around that scene – was it the genesis of the story? Or did the story exist in your mind and the scene helped it along?

Well, first of all, Naomi drops plates. Very expensive, custom-made, English plates that the hotel she runs had just received that day from the manufacturer.

I can’t say the novel is built around that scene, but it was certainly the reason why I began writing the book, it was the genesis. Somehow I had to get to that scene, and I made up the story of Jon and the letter, and how he goes to Norway to find Naomi. At that time, I had no idea this rather short story would grow into a novel, let alone three. Or more, who knows. When my publisher asked for the manuscript and then accepted it, I was more than stunned. For me, it wasn’t enough of a story.

Two people lose their love, find each other, fall in love again, get married, and life takes a turn toward disaster. End of story.

Luckily, I’m the only one who thinks that way. Everyone else loves it!

You live in Hamburg, Germany? The Distant Shore takes place in California, Norway… I actually wrote a travel post about a golf course in Norway, above the Arctic Circle – so I loved the description of Jon landing there with just a jacket from his home in California! Have you lived in or visited the places in your scenes throughout your book? Not too many novels have a rock star chasing his ex-girlfriend down to an inn in Norway! [My novel takes place in Germany, Italy and Greece in 1967.]

In one word: Yes. All the places you will visit in “The Distant Shore” exist, and I’ve been to all of them. Well, not to the place Naomi’s family own outside Toronto, but the small town, Kleinburg, exists. It’s home to the really beautiful McMichael Canadian Collection. I’ve spent many hours there.

The Norwegian village is actually the small town Floro, and I’ve modeled the Seaside Hotel on a hotel there. It is not the same place though, and all the people are totally made up. Which, by the way, also goes for Jon and Naomi, Sal, Art and Russ. No real people here. I could say (quite arrogantly) that I don’t need to model my characters on real people. I enjoy making them up too much to settle for real people.

There are not many novels about a rock star chasing his ex-girlfriend down to Norway from California? Heck, I hope so! How else would “The Distant Shore” become a bestseller book and an Academy Awards movie?

The other thing that struck me was that we’re both writing about a young woman being in love with a talented man. Yours is in his 40’s and tremendously successful. Mine is in his 20’s and his fame is yet to be determined. Do you think talent complicates relationships and great loves? Naomi and Jon end up in a creative relationship as well as being lovers again. Is creativity an aphrodisiac, do you think?

Ah. Interesting question. Their talent is the reason why these two meet in the first place. Naomi, barely nineteen, hears Jon on the radio one day, while she is vacuuming her room at her parents’ house in Geneva. That voice, that music, drive her into a writing frenzy. She sticks the lyrics she writes into an envelope, writes a note saying, “Sing this!” and sends it off to Jon’s office. A while later, when Jon is on a tour through Europe, he meets her to talk about those lyrics, and they fall in love. She goes to California with him, and lives with him.

Three years later, Jon’s growing fame, his wild life, and a drug bust at their house drives her away and into hiding in Norway.

I write a lot about creativity, and about creative process. I’ve analyzed how it creativity works differently for Jon and Naomi, how Jon, with no musical education, makes his way into rock stardom the good, old-fashioned way, while Naomi has it all: piano lessons from an early age, classical singing, the best Swiss private schools.

Honestly, I don’t think creativity is an aphrodisiac. My poor hubby has to put up with all my moods and eccentricities, and I can tell you, there are a few of those.

Twitter has played quite a part in your novel’s path to being published. Can you tell a little about it (Buddhapuss)? You have a book tour coming up in the US in summer?

My publisher and I met on twitter. I’ve told this story often and on many blogs, so I’ll not repeat it here again. I’m very happy where I am. Buddhapuss is a wonderful publisher with a lot of experience, patience and passion for their work. I’ve been extremely lucky in signing with them, and I don’t plan on leaving them if they don’t kick me out.

The book tour won’t be this summer. My publisher and I talked about this at length, and I balked a bit at the change of plans. But she was right, as she is nearly always. I’ll be going on the book tour in March and/or April, after book three of the Stone Trilogy has been published. That will give us enough time to do the editing and work necessary to get two more books out in less than a year’s time!

This is cool.

I’m saying this so easily, but actually it’s really, really cool. I know that in about a year from now, I’ll have published three books. A dream. MY dream. Come true.

I think we first connected on Twitter when your son was “romancing” a girl by not paying attention to her – and I told you how my youngest son did the same to a girl in high school. The other thing that drew me to read your tweets was the wonderful haiku you write sometimes. What’s your usual writing day like? You’re working on Book 3 now in a trilogy about the rock star Jonathon Stone?

My work day begins around 9 am in the morning, when the cat and I crawl out of bed. I make coffee, feed the cat. I turn on the computer and check my mail, twitter and facebook while I drink my first cup. Since The Distant Shore has been launched I sneak over to Amazon to see how the book is doing, and then I open my writing file. Oh yes. I open my writing file, and I dive into that world I have created and begin to spin my tale.

I love tweeting haikus. In fact, I started writing haikus on twitter, thanks to @Pookandgrace and her #haikuwordgame. Now I write my haikus on Facebook and combine them with Eric G. Thompson’s art. He did the painting which is on the cover of The Distant Shore. I adore his art!

Oh, and my son? That method didn’t get him anywhere. The girl ignored him.

The other thing I found common with us was how you got into the production side of the rock concerts you went to… and I loved that side of PGA Tour televised tournaments. When my ex-husband ( a former player) was doing on-course commentary for television, I loved the cameramen and production trucks and sound guys…

PS Watched you on a video from a TV station – you have the loveliest accent!

HAHA! Thank you. I was incredibly excited. That interview wasn’t planned, I was visiting with my friend Bunny in Lynchburg VA, and she took me with her to work. She’s a producer for the local ABC station, and they kidnapped me for that interview!

###

This was the tenth stop on Mariam’s The Distant Shore “Love is in the Air” Blog Hop & Giveaway. We hope you enjoyed this interview and will join us tomorrow on the next stop at Book Reviews by Elizabeth White for a post called Slaying Dragons.

Buddhapuss Ink is giving away copies of Mariam’s book, along with some pretty terrific (and very romantic) gifts, as we count down to that most romantic day of the year—Valentine’s Day!

Want to enter the giveaway?

Leave a comment for this post for one entry. We also encourage you to “Like” this blog and follow it!

Tweet a link to this blog including the hashtag #TDSBlogHop for another chance to win.

Want more chances to win? CLICK HERE for all the info!

Want to see that TV interview that Mariam and Marci mentioned? Here it is.

I swear I do have a funnier side. I saw this You Tube video this morning and have to share it.

A routine golf cart patrol turns deadly…

“It’s a goddam driving range out here!”

“Get those nine-irons up on that bunker!”

Seriously, you have to watch this.

The Golf War

Wow. There it was. Tucked in a file of notes, pieces of writing and old magazine covers: The letter I wrote to the late Peter Dobereiner, venerable British golf writer and former columnist for Golf Digest — the letter that led to my first national magazine article.

I’m a keeper. I keep everything I think is important to the story of my life, my family’s life, my professional life. But I didn’t realize I had this letter. When I sat down to read it, I knew I had to share it with you. I’d written to him with a complaint and (semi) insult about a column he’d written. He fired back. This is my response. It led me to query Golf Digest — and they gave me an assignment that resulted in a major feature that was reprinted in Australian Golf Magazine and in an airline magazine (forgot which one).

This was written in 1982. That’s me up there, then.

January 4, 1982

Dear Mr. Dobereiner,

What a pleasure — and a genuine surprise — to receive your kind reply. I hope the holidays were happy for you, too.

Since we apparently got our wires crossed as to your theme in the column in question, shall we let it pass, and be friends?

I do agree that most post-round analyses by pros leave much to be desired in terms of the English language. However, this could be attributed to two factors: 1) The questions asked by the media are fairly dull, or 2) A great many of the pros are from the Sun Belt, where constant exposure to solar rays and intense heat have turned their minds to the consistency of yellow squash casserole.

Now, to the job at hand:

I did (rather brazenly) offer an idea for a “decent column,” and being a woman of my word, I will not beg off.

I’m afraid my view and experience are fairly biased. This week Terry begins his ninth year on the Tour, and for better or worse, I begin my ninth year as a Tour Wife.

What do you think when you read “Tour Wife”? I’ll tell you what most people envision: Some pretty, slim, tanned young woman strolling down fairway after fairway, umbrella-seat in hand, sharing in the glamorous life her husband leads. When she’s not following her husband on the course, she attends tournament-sponsored luncheons and fashion shows, and shops at all the best malls in the U.S.

And believe me, a fair portion of the wives live this way.

However, my experience as a Tour Wife has been very different. For one thing (and this makes a huge difference), we started out on the Tour with two children, and have since had two more. Life on the Tour with four children in a hotel room is no life at all. Not on a regular basis. It’s a one-way ticket to a padded room. We won’t even mention the expense. Our two eldest boys soon reached school-age, which further limited our ability to travel.

Frankly, aside from the logistical problems of traveling with four children, a steady diet of lunches, fashion shows and endless shopping would put me on an express to Total Boredom.

So, I stay home, except for occasional excursions onto the Tour with Terry.

Which means — well, a very great deal.

Last year, I kept a precise record of how much time Terry actually spent in our home, just out of curiosity. It came to a total of ten weeks and five days, out of 10 months — December 1980 – October 1981. We traveled as a family only twice, due to emergency surgery for our youngest son last summer.

During the summer, Terry flew or drove home on Sunday nights following his last round [the Tour schedule stayed mostly in the NE then] took the [older] boys to their golf lessons at 8a.m. Monday mornings, took them to soccer practice Monday evenings, and left for the next tournament on Tuesdays.

It’s not easy to be an involved father and still try to win golf tournaments — rather like trying to be in two places at the same time. But I think he does a spectacular job, sometimes at his own expense.

We live, in essence, three separate lives: His, Mine, and Ours.

There are times when we don’t see each other for up to seven weeks at a time; for instance, when he’s playing the winter West Coast tournaments [the schedule is very different for today's Tour players].

There are times when he’s playing drenched with sweat in the Florida sun, with an eight footer to make the cut, while I’m at home shoveling two feet of snow.

There are times when all the children are sick, the plumbing is leaking, and the lady of the house is ready to tear up her union card — and he calls to say he thinks he’d better stay out and play another two weeks — we need the checks. (And we pray there will be checks.)

There are times when he’s lonely and homesick, or just plain sick, and he wants to skip an important tournament, pack it in, give it up — and I give him a pep talk worthy of Vince Lombardi. Then I cry after we hang up, because I want to give up, too.

Yes, there are times when we travel to lovely places, meet exciting people, hear the galleries roar and applaud — but the day-to-day existence of our lives is made up mostly of separations, perseverance, grit and a sense of humor.

Life on the fringes of the Top 60 is quite a bit different from the Top 10 most people read about: emotionally, financially, psychologically — as a player, as a married couple, and as parents.

And yet, I think Terry and I have come to terms with our way of life. We’re happy, despite our long-distance marriage. We’re survivors. The Tour, for all its stresses, is where Terry belongs. I’m very satisfied with how I’ve learned to pilot the ship at home, to be self-reliant, not to have lost myself in my husband’s identity. I think Terry is pleased, too.

Oh, there is much more to it, but I may have to mail this bulk-rate overseas, as it is.

If there is a column in this, you are welcome to it. ( I wonder if there may not be an article in it for me. Have you surmised? I’m not a politician, but I do have a modest, if not glittering, career as a freelance writer.)

Please write again if there is more that I can do. After nine years keeping my eyes and ears open on the Tour, you’d be surprised at what I know.

Friends, I hope,

Marci Diehl

P.S. You’re right about Hemingway. [ No idea what this was referring to. ]

That was 1982. By 1984, Terry’s career playing the Tour was over. Ten years later, we were apart. The long distance marriage I was so proud of handling couldn’t survive the multiplying stresses it endured. My career as a writer built — I wrote more articles for Golf Digest, and was on a track to become a real golf writer ( a track I jumped off, in favor of lifestyle and business). I took a risk to write this letter and I don’t regret it.