Our starting time for the day was 2:40pm which is the second last time of the day. It makes for a long morning of sitting around waiting, stewing, and allows time an anxious mind to spin.
We arrived at the golf course at around 12:30. The weather was clear and hot, for the most part, not a breath of wind.
Once again Terry was looking dashing in his fresh outfit.
We were there in plenty of time which allowed for him to really take his time and have a relaxed, methodical warm up session. Once again, he ripped every shot right at every flag he looked at. We chipped, we putted, and finally it was time.
As we headed to the first tee he said he felt way more nervous today than the first day. He was plenty nervous the first day and still managed to rip it down the middle of the fairway so I knew he would handle it just fine.
His drive was a bit left in the rough, but his lie was decent and we were off.
Once again, I’m not going to go through every hole, but we felt the effects of the US Open rough a few times on that front 9.
On the second hole he pulled a drive a bit left again, not far away from the spotter. As we were walking up there was a team of about 5 people looking for his ball. It had landed right in front of them and the fact that they were having trouble locating it didn’t bode well for the type of lie he was going to get. Finally they stopped looking and placed their little locator flag near it.
As we were approaching it I knew we were going to be in for a bit of trouble when I see a spectator crouch down and get a picture of it. You know you have a crap lie when it is photo worthy.
We got to the ball and you could barely see it even while standing right over top of it! It was sitting down at the bottom with wisps of grass laying over the top of it. There was nothing he could do but gouge it out. Not all bogies are created equal and that was a good one.
Around about the 5th hole I could feel Terry start to relax and settle in and sound like himself. We were finally to the point where we were out there playing golf. He was swinging more freely than he had the whole week, and was talking more and the color was back in his face! He hit some good shots and made some great putts, but still not hitting his driver as straight as he can which didn’t allow him to really throw darts with his irons like he can.
We get to the back 9 and I just told him: let’s start ripping drivers and firing at flags, and so he did. He absolutely nailed a drive on that 10th tee and off we went.
He had a fantastic chip in birdie on the 12th and his cheering section went crazy. The volunteer said that was the only birdie they had seen there all day! The next hole, birdie. He was on it now!
He followed a couple bogeys on 15 and 16 with a fantastic birdie on 17 and left one an inch short on 18. He fired a nice 74 for the day which was a good score in relation to the field.
The cut was +6 so we missed that, but from my view, which was the front seat, there was so much to be proud of for Terry.
It’s easy to look at his scores and make a judgement. Anyone who knows Terry knows how good he is. We all know how straight he is off the tee, how accurate his irons are, how well he pitches and chips and how many birdies he’s made in the last few months. Believe me, I’ve also had a front seat to that show and feel it in my wallet every time I’m paying him out. I may nip him for 9 here and there, but he gladly accepts his winnings on a daily basis.
Pressure, however, does funny things to a person. Here is Terry who has overcome so much in his life, decides to enter a qualifier for the US Open, after not playing in a proper tournament in 20 years and wins the thing. That shows a lot about his determination and his resolve.
He comes here and is playing on the worlds stage, the pressure doesn’t get any higher than this.
I was texting with him in the morning just about nothing, what he was doing etc. He told me he was replying to texts etc. He and I decompressed a little bit after round 1, but not fully. I asked him how he was describing his round to people. I wanted to know how he viewed it.
He replied with something like: ‘I played a bad round, no excuses’, moving on to today.’
I agreed with the ‘moving onto today’ part, but the rest of it did NOT sit well with me. I said something like: yes, let’s move on, but we will discuss the rest at a later date.
He asked about what I meant, so I let him have it. I won’t share exactly what I said to him, but it was something along the lines of: to classify the round in such a way is, first of all not true, and doing such a disservice to himself and allows for no room to learn.
I saw his round on day one as a win in so many ways. He was so nervous on the first tee I could see his shirt shaking! In spite of that he managed to absolutely rip his tee shot down the middle. In spite of feeling like an absolute nervous wreck all day he still managed to hit so many good iron shots. He had some blips in his round that, like I said, really could have derailed him, and he went to the next hole and executed brilliantly. Win. In spite of feeling 100% NOT himself, he managed to get it around that golf course in a more than respectable manner.
In that round of 18 holes I saw him overcome so much with his inner demons that were just waiting to take him down. He fought them off, and believe me, it was a battle of epic proportions, and he did it. It was a 79 that first day, but it could have been so much worse. I told him that he better start giving himself the credit that he deserves, because he really deserves a lot.
I am so proud and grateful to be part of this journey with Terry. I know his brothers, Pat, Matt, Tim, Joe and sister in law Jody and his buddy Cal are all so proud of him. They are all so sweet and it was so heartwarming to see their support. Terry is not a man of many words, but I know it meant so much to him for them to be here.
In the losing comes the learning. I’m glad he went through every single thing he went through. All the adversity, and all the triggers are gifts (even if they feel terrible) that help us discover more about ourselves. Terry will get some space from the tournament and be able to look back with less emotion and glean so many good things from this. It’s only going to make him a better golfer and breed more awareness as a person.
I’m proud to call Terry my friend.
That’s a wrap folks! I hope you enjoyed this little journey. It was fun sharing it with everyone. I had a blast and would carry his bag anytime except the next course hopefully is not as hilly.
-Caddy out ✌🏼
Never Mind About That. 
Thanks Carina for keeping us posted and pictures are always great. Terry played great despite what his score showed. I’m so proud of him. I think you were the best caddy for him! Thank you. Kari