On Sunday, my son and I won our local Father’s Day, Father/Son Golf Tournament for the seventh time in eight tries. Mind you, neither of us is great, but are both better than the average duffer. Playing ‘alternate shot,’ a tricky format where father alternates with son hitting one ball until it is in the cup, we scored a 41 on a par 33 course, to beat a 43 and a 45, the next best scores out of 10 teams. It wasn’t the best we’ve scored in the tournament, but it was rainy and poor conditions for playing good golf.

My son and I play most weekends during the summer when he’s back from college, and both of us regularly score in the high 80’s or low 90’s. These days, he usually beats me by 4 to 8 strokes. The first year we played in the tournament, when he was 10, and I was 43, it was the other way around. The past couple of tournaments, with his long, accurate drives and approach shots, he carried us through my topped drives and mishits. The first couple of wins, I probably carried us in the same way.

Though we don’t know them that well, it’s clear that the other fathers and sons who play in the tournament are not regular golfers. They don’t practise or prepare for the tournament; they just enjoy it for the opportunity it provides for father/son bonding, working toward a common goal, sharing ups and downs, but most of all, having fun and enjoying each other’s company.

We play for the same reason — but we also enjoy winning. We enjoy the golf we play together in the weeks leading up to the tournament, practising together, preparing for the competition. We enjoy playing well enough to win and having the confidence to know we can win, regardless of how relative that success is. We cannot ignore how these wins fill us with pride, how the others look upon us with respect, even if it is tinged somewhat with bitterness at our continued success.

It’s gotten to the point where, when we receive the invitation to the tournament every year, we both look on it with mixed feelings. We debate whether we should play. We both enjoy winning yet are embarrassed by our continued success and by the looks of resentment we get from some of the other players for taking the suspense out of the tournament — and also for being interlopers.

Most of the other fathers and sons know each other because the boys went to the same schools together. My son did not attend that school and we happened to get our first invitation to the tournament because the host’s son was on the same town soccer team as was my son and, as will happen during sideline discussions, we found out we both enjoyed golf.

My son stopped playing soccer years ago and, as such, we only see these people once a year at this tournament, whereas they socialize with each other throughout the year. My son and I have the misfortune to share a certain innate awkwardness in social settings, which doesn’t help with this tournament. We’re not very comfortable with small talk and, as such, don’t have much to say to the other players. I’m fairly certain that awkwardness is interpreted as arrogance, which doesn’t help matters.

So it is with mixed feelings that we continue to participate in the tournament. Looking at the big picture, it’s not so important an occasion that our predicament bears much weight in our lives or those of the other players. And it’s not like the others don’t have other prizes to compete for — longest drive and closest to the hole, money for birdies and first in the cup (though my son takes his fair share of these, too).

Still, we know how we’re perceived. On Father’s Day, my son and I are the ‘Evil Empire’ of the Father/Son tournament, the perennial favorites everyone loves to hate. When we were announced as winners this year, everyone applauded politely, but briefly, and one boy said, for the second year in a row, half-jesting, half-serious, “You just had to come back, didn’t you?”

Only once has a team beaten us, and it just so happens that year was the only time they participated. We came in second, even though I got a hole in one that year (the only one I’ve every had) and it was the best score we’ve ever gotten in the tournament – a 39 to their 36. Perhaps, had they participated every year, they would have seven victories, instead of us. Perhaps, they didn’t come back because they felt they were too good to play in the tournament.

My son and I will probably keep coming back, happy for another chance to team up. We know we are not that good, but can’t help being pleased to know we’re good enough.

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