20. Keep Your Eye on the Ball

I have read a lot of advice on Medium about how best to live your life, succeed in business, accomplish your dreams, etc. etc. (Full disclosure: I rarely read the whole story, but I read a lot of headlines.) Most of it boils down to having a goal and working toward it. Among my favorites is “Keep your eye on the ball,” a terrible metaphor for me since I have no interest in sports.

I am so sports-neutral that I once almost lost a job because of it. My boss wanted me to take up golf: all our important clients played golf and he was convinced that if I wandered around on the greens with them, business would improve.

As a good soldier, I considered it. Getting out of the office and into the open air on company time appealed to me, although I knew all my work would still be on my desk while I was away. I wondered why my boss didn’t play golf. I wondered how our clients had time to play golf.

While procrastinating I bought a golf simulation game for my computer. It was the best thing I could think of at the time. In between putting out fires in my department, I would putt around on cybernetic golf courses. After about three minutes, I would nod. At five I would fall asleep.

I scheduled a class with a golf pro. It was on a course owned by a reality star who hallucinated about being president of the USA, a bad omen. The pro and I stood on a grassy knoll — another bad omen — and he sort of hugged me and held my hand over a club. After about three minutes I nodded. At five I rallied and thrashed at the ball. At six I quit, but I had improved my time on game.

I claimed I hurt my back. My boss confided that the same thing happened to him. My job was safe.

Anytime someone tells me to keep my eye on the ball, I think about golf. My advice is to forget about the ball and watch your back.

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Shameless self-promotion: Here is a shortcut to all my stories on Medium.