Sjarif Goldstein: Golfing with son, friends is a gift that should be appreciated

For a stretch in the late ’90s, I played golf at least once a week. When my wife-to-be, Jenni, was about to head to the mainland for graduate school, I bought a cheap set of clubs at Kmart with the intent of having some good walks spoiled.

Still, it was a year or so before I got onto a course. It can be intimidating to start to play golf. Sure, I had the equipment, but I still had to learn to hit well enough not to embarrass myself and couldn’t afford private lessons. Golf also has more rules to learn than most recreational sports — not just keeping score and how to handle lost balls but course etiquette too.

I got the push I needed when the Star-Bulletin hired a new wire editor from Ohio named Greg.

Both in our mid-20s, Greg and I became fast friends working together on the copy desk. Our early morning work schedules and his wife Jan’s military status made it easier to get tee times, usually for discounted twilight rounds. He started me out on the Hickam Par-3, but we swiftly — maybe too swiftly — moved on to Mamala Bay.

My childhood friend Matt and my college buddies Ryan and Kell joined in when they could and we played all over Oahu. But one course that found its way into the mix more than most was Fort Shafter’s Walter J. Nagorski Golf Course.

Nagorski is a nine-hole, par-34 layout. I personally believe rounds of golf are a tad long at 18 holes, but it’s not worth the effort to play just nine holes — 14-15 would be perfect — so we’d almost always go two laps for a full 18.

What I loved about Nagorski was how it lacked the rigidity of your finer courses yet was in better shape than some of those where keeping the grass green seemed to be a problem — “dog tracks,” as my friend Chris called them.

I probably also loved that I played there so often that it was the one course where I was able to build some record of success. Each visit gave me two shots at each hole, so I birdied nearly every hole there, including the par-5 once using my 3-iron on every shot — including the 6-inch putt — because I was struggling with my driver.

But to me golf was not as much about reducing my handicap as it was about getting some quality time with good friends — busting each others’ chops, dropping “Caddyshack” quotes (I know), and wagering on our putting prowess or who could get closest to the pin. I’m not one of those guys who fantasized in my head of someday making the senior tour — heck, I only broke 100 a handful of times in three years of regular play — but I still wanted to do well each time out, and having my closest friends out there with me made what could be an aggravating game … enjoyable.

My days as a regular golfer came to an end in 1999 when the Star-Bulletin announced it would be closing, prompting me and my wife to move to the Bay Area. We came back 15 months later to start a family after the paper was saved by David Black, but Greg and his family had moved to Kentucky by then, and with a son on the way, I had less disposable income (and time) to dedicate to golf anyway.

I dropped down to one or two rounds a year — and eventually none.

But this summer I found a reason to play my first round in more than six years.

My son, Quinn, started going to the driving range with his friends pretty regularly earlier this year. He left for college a couple of years ago, but COVID-19 brought him back to the islands for the past 18 months. It robbed him of some of his college experience, but it gave us more time together, especially as the pandemic meant working from home.

Because I’ve worked nights since before he was born, I haven’t had the chance to play the role in his sporting pursuits that my dad did with me. My father and I played catch with a baseball several times a week when I was a kid, sometimes in the street while waiting for my mom’s bus home from work, to save her that 200-yard walk up the street to our house.

Quinn played baseball for a few seasons, and we’d have a catch once in a while, but I was usually at work when he went to practice, so Jenni was left to take him, usually with our young daughter, Mara, in tow, and often having to go home to cook dinner.

We’d shoot hoops once in a while, but his main sport turned out to be water polo, which I had no experience with. But he loved it and so I loved watching him play.

But when he started going to the driving range this year, it gave me an opportunity to share something with him, so when he wanted to practice and none of his friends could go, I’d tag along to give him company, even though the repeated swinging was tough on my bum shoulder. I told him maybe we could get out for a round before he had to fly back to the mainland for college and even suggested the Nagorski course.

We only made it out to the range together a couple of times and I kind of gave up on the idea of playing golf with him before school started, but he and his friends kept going, and enough of them had a clue that they helped him build the foundation of a decent swing.

When it was time to try their hand at playing on a real course, they took it slowly, playing the Hawaii Kai Executive Course, which is all par-3s.

Then one day, a week or so before he was set to return to college, he asked me, “So did you want to play a round of golf before I leave?”

It had been the furthest thing from my mind, but he remembered what I told him about Nagorski and wanted to give it a shot. Though it’s a military course, civilians can play — and even make a tee time — without a sponsor.

So I got Matt and Ryan to fill out our foursome and we played the old course a couple of weeks ago. I hadn’t been there in more than 20 years, but it was almost exactly as I remembered. They turned Nos. 3 and 4 into a par-3 and a par-5 — they used to be two par-4s — and I think they took down some trees around the tee box on No. 2 that turned it into a drive-lengthening wind tunnel, but otherwise it was pretty much the same.

And yet, playing it with my son was a whole new experience. I could tell him where to hit and what areas to avoid, though I let my friends dish out the actual swing advice. I had anecdotes about most of the holes, and we got to take in the view of the city and ocean from the elevated fifth tee.

I hadn’t even been to a driving range in a few months — and that was all off tee or fake grass, so I feared that I would be unable to hit even decently, especially off natural grass. My short game was terrible, but overall I didn’t embarrass myself, and I even parred the last two holes.

But most important, I got to spend a few hours on a golf course with my son, and as great as the times have been playing golf with friends, nothing beats that.