Under the trees at Dunedin Country Club, Chris Long poured his dad into a golf shoe. At the 10th hole he sprinkled the ashes next to the sand trap. "Dad was always good around the green,'' Long said.
For a half century, Jim Long was a fanatical golfer who played every day if he could. He was especially good with short irons from the rough or sand trap.
"We called him Houdini,'' one of his oldest friends, Phil Desreaux, said from the lip of the green. "If he got into trouble, he could always escape.''
Almost always. On Sept. 7, as he got ready to putt for a birdie, Jim Long dropped dead. He was 70.
A few days later, his family and hundreds of friends gathered to say goodbye at the golf course. They told stories about how he drew faces on his golf balls and always carried a bottle of Jim Beam in his bag. They wept, laughed and toasted his memory.
A few spoke in reverent tones about his new set of Adams golf clubs with the graphite shafts.
"He didn't tell me he bought them,'' his wife, Joann, was telling people. "I just noticed them one day. He'd put them on the Master Charge. Kind of sneaky.'' In the endless chess game called marriage, she considered running over to Macy's and buying herself a new outfit in revenge.
They had met in 1984. A Canadian, Jim was on a Florida golf vacation. He was divorced. So was she. At a nightclub he asked for a dance. They married four months later. He owned an architectural hardware consulting business in Canada but was happy to move to Florida and its year-round golfing climate. She was okay with her role as golf widow.
Jim was funny, and he was good to her, but he wasn't perfect. Joann fussed at him whenever he reached for a Marlboro. Riding a golf cart was his primary source of exercise. He ate too much Breyers vanilla ice cream and watched too much TV. On the night before he died, she fixed him his favorite meal: grilled chicken and fresh corn cut from the cob. Even after one heart attack and a pacemaker, he feared no pat of butter.
On Sept. 7, a Sunday, he drove his personal golf cart from the house to the golf course two blocks away to meet Whitey Williams and Billy Turner, the other members of his regular threesome.
Jim double-bogeyed the first and second holes. He usually shot in the low 80s, but today his game was off.
On the seventh, he told his companions his latest story:
"A long-married couple are fighting because hubby has forgotten their anniversary. Wifey tells him there had better be something waiting in the driveway tomorrow morning — something that can go 0 to 200 in six seconds.
"Next morning, she sees a package on the driveway. Must be the keys to a new sports car. She can't wait. With shaking hands she opens the package and discovers — a bathroom scale.''
Jim bogeyed the 364-yard, par-four ninth. He was starting to play better, but he complained about an aching back and a cold sweat. His friends suggested a cool drink and a rest. Jim didn't want to miss any golf.
His drive exceeded 220 yards on the par 5, 477-yard 10th hole. His second shot, with a 3-wood, floated to the edge of the green. Now a graceful 9-iron left him 8 feet from the pin — and a birdie.
He grabbed his putter and climbed onto the green.
He fell right next to the hole. In life, he never believed in mulligans; Billy Turner's attempts to revive him failed.
Last Friday at dusk, while the memorial was still going strong at the clubhouse, Jim's family and closest friends headed quietly for the 10th green. A slight breeze rustled the Spanish moss hanging from the oaks. The cicadas sang a requiem.
Jim's son, Chris, sprinkled more ashes from his dad's size 10 FootJoys. "There's still plenty of Dad left to go around,'' Chris said, handing off the shoes to Tom Shores and Phil Desreaux.
Shores, Jim's son-in-law, lifted the flag. Desreaux, Jim's old friend from Canada, poured in the ashes.
Hole in one.
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