Chicken Soup for the Holes

It’s always something.

California summer mornings feel like east coast autumn ones to me, but even so, early June reminds me of how my father and I used to play golf together. Even though we were both terrible, a couple times a year I’d take the New Jersey Transit down from New York to the Hamilton station and he’d pick me up and take me back to their condo in Ambler, Pa. to hang out, have some dinner, watch the Phillies–nothing rowdy–the night before we golfed. We’d usually have a ridiculously early tee time and he always wanted to hit balls first beforehand so sometimes it'd still be dark, even in early summer.

I'd wake up, and he'd have donuts for us, and in his well-pressed khaki shorts, he'd hand me one of his old double-XL Polo shirts that had shrunk in the dryer to wear because I usually didn't bring one, let alone own one. He'd have my golf shoes all cleaned in the garage, sometimes with a new sleeve of balls tucked in them like the Easter Bunny would do when I was a little boy. We'd head over to the course, hot coffee in portable mugs, full of the promise of possibly once and for all having both of us both break 100 on the same day.

But it never happened. 

The lightness of the conversation on the way home would be dictated by how well we both played that day but, again, we were both terrible golfers, so there were minimal highlights. As much as we loved each other when we didn't hate each other, our conflict resolution was infantile, so the more complicated car-ride conversations quickly got ugly. For most of the 2000s, I'd have another agenda to come home to, usually because I'd always struggled to pay my bills while trying to make a living as a writer in a city I could not afford.

On Father’s Day in 2006, while driving back from his shitty country club in Northeast Philadelphia, quiet and demoralized after another triple-digit round, I decided to tell my father about my cocaine problem. I don't remember how I jumped into it–we weren't big on discussing my substance misadventures even when it was clear I was getting fucked up often. There was an awkward silence, though not an angry one, which was a relief because my father could radiate contempt and disappointment without moving any of his facial muscles.

I don't think he said anything reassuring or expressed concern, but I remember that he said, "I think my brother had a problem with cocaine," which is to say my father was at a loss for words. 

Even when we pulled up the driveway and went inside the condo, I still couldn't get a beat on how we'd proceed. I was vulnerable and a little antsy about what was to come but also relieved because it's hard to be honest about drugs. 

I sat downstairs in their finished basement with my mother to have our brief catch-up (but not about the drugs) as we waited for my father to finish undressing out of his golf attire. The basement was tricked out with golf-themed knick-knacks from HomeGoods and TJ Maxx, the kind you'd probably find in a knockoff Irish Pub, like little plaques behind the bar that welcomed visitors to the 19th Hole and coasters from country clubs he'd either played or wanted to play. 

Most of the photos on my father's downstairs computer desk were of him in different foursomes, smiling like he never smiled at home. There was also a three-and-half-foot tall ceramic golfer that looked like the Monopoly man but dressed like a golfer from the 1920s, which sat at the foot of the stairs that startled me on more than one occasion because I'd forget it was there. All this stuff would make anyone think that my father was a great golfer, but, again, he stunk.

Soon after my mother and I settled into our conversation, my father decided to tell her about what we'd discussed on the car ride home. 

"Do you know what your son is spending money on? COCAINE!"

He'd become wall-shakingly unhinged. I'd seen him yell this way before, mostly at her, sometimes at me, but this was operatically volcanic, borderline insane.

Once my mother heard 'cocaine,' she doubled down on the shame and said, "Nuh-uh, no druggies in this house," but my father wasn't finished. 

"No one will ever hire you in New York because you now have a reputation. You can't afford –you've never been able to afford it. You're a LOSER." 

This wasn't the first time my father had called me a loser, but it was the loudest, most shocking instance. I felt a little sorry for him because the velocity at which it left his mouth came from a terrified and ancient place like someone had whacked him in the back with a broomstick to dislodge the "LOSER!" stuck in his windpipe. 

We all got quiet. Even the golfer statue seemed shook. 

I took the hint. I called a friend to pick me up from their house and waited on the curb about 50 feet in front of their condo, still in my golf shoes, with a sloppily packed overnight bag slung over my shoulder like a suburban hobo. The bag was still stuffed with the magazines and giant water bottle I spent $30 on at Hudson Booksellers, which was a blessing because I couldn't afford to buy anything else for the ride back.

*****

Growing up, I thought my father was a part action figure, part movie star, but indeed an important businessman bursting with confidence and know-how, a man who'd figured it all out and whose footsteps were worth following if capital-S 'success' was the goal. Yet, my Dad considered his father, my grandfather, meek and indecisive, too hen-pecked to ever light out on his own. 

I thought this, too, up until I got old enough to see them both as humans. It turned out to be the opposite. My father was hobbled by fear and insecurity, but my grandfather held a gentleness on the verge of grace. He also had integrity; my father had avarice. 

Still, when my grandfather came down with Alzheimer's, I could tell my Dad knew he'd gone about their relationship all wrong. My grandfather's final pitiful days were spent in a hospice care facility. By that point, he was just ribs and soft pajamas whose mouth was frozen in that deathly O-shape big enough to stick an olive into it.

Even though my grandfather's memory was erased, I witnessed my father's useless attempt to get through one last time. His leg bounced up and down as he sat beside the hospital bed. The nurse positioned the bed in that lonely recline of the dying because he had visitors. My father grew more desperate for some reconciliation and love.

"I'm here. I'm right here. You're having a good day." Things of that nature. 

They always golfed together, and my grandfather was terrible, too. One of the last rounds they played when the Alzheimer's loomed was uniquely arduous. However, that ended on a memorable high note because my grandfather tried to use a butterscotch candy as a ball marker which cracked my Dad up. 

I memory-banked that moment, and almost a decade later, when I was 23, I decided to write about it–from my father's perspective–and submit it as an essay to Chicken Soup for the Golfer's Soul. 

According to the acceptance letter I received about nine months later, the essay was one of the top 101 out of thousands of submissions. When the book finally came out, just in time for Father's Day 1998, my family considered it one of the most outstanding literary achievements in history. I signed many books for friends, relatives, and even my mother's hairdresser, with the same insignia each time–storyteller, pg. 206. 

I drove to our local Barnes and Noble, the one located in those suburban shopping centers that are the same everywhere in America, occupied by bagel shops and the Dick's Sporting Goods and the Ross Dress for Less, to go see my book in the wild. The B & N had "Chicken Soup for the Golfer's Soul" prominently displayed in a "Great Gifts for Dad" section, alongside the James Pattersons and the Clive Cusslers and the books wars and baseball. It was actually number one on the New York Times bestseller list at that moment in time, along with like four other "Chicken Soup for the Souls." 

As a fee for publishing my story, they paid me $200 and sent me three extra copies, one of which was autographed by Jack Canfield, the overlord of the Chicken Soup enterprise. Still: I wanted to purchase one as a regular everyday customer. I secretly wished the aloof, frizzy-haired college kid ringing me up would express some interest in my purchase just so I could say, "I'm in this one," as I point to the page number with my byline in a fancy font. Maybe he'd ask me to sign some copies or do a live reading event. I thought this was a real possibility because how many authors who appeared in best-selling books lived at their parents' house only one mile away?

Instead, he informed me that my credit card was declined. For a brief moment, I contemplated clearing my throat so I could indignantly point to the page number just as I'd initially planned to–Um, I'm actually in this one??!!–but I thought better of it and walked out with nothing. 

*****

I attempt to rewrite the story of my father and my grandfather and Alzheimer's and fatherhood and "Chicken Soup for the Golfer's Soul" every Father's Day, even though I've written about it many times before. I will probably write about it again next year because I always remember it differently, so the story constantly changes. 

I tried to write a version of this story for MEL magazine back in 2017. The editor was a guy I'd worked with when he was at "Playboy," and he was one of the only editors still willing to pay me to write after the Hogan trial. I got paid $1,000. I was so paranoid about having more than three figures in my banking account because I was sure a Florida court would put a lien on it again, but everything was fine.

After a couple of false starts, it was finished. It was a mawkish, overworked essay, but I was still happy it was out in the world. Five years ago, I first began noticing my father's short-term memory loss. He said he read the essay, but I could tell he hadn't. Or maybe he had simply forgotten about it like many other things he forgot by then.

My major problem with the finished product was their headline–"Chicken Soup for The Son's Soul"–which made it sound even more mawkish. In my original draft, the title was "Chicken Soup for the Holes," meant to represent the emptiness in both my father's and my heart. Plus, I thought it was a clever play on the holes in a golf course. It was also a metaphor for wholeness and recovery–the kind we aspire to but can never achieve. I was offended that they didn't use it. I concluded their headline writers were just lazy. 

When I told my wife Julieanne how excited I was to finally use my original, more stylized, and heartfelt headline for this newsletter, I expected her to be as loving and supportive as she is about my writing. Instead, she laughed in my face because she said they didn't use it because that title was pornographic. Her whole comment was that the headline sounded like "soup was being poured into someone's butt."

I attempt to rewrite the story of my father and my grandfather and Alzheimer's and fatherhood and "Chicken Soup for the Golfer's Soul" every Father's Day, even though I've written about it many times before. I will probably write about it again next year because I always remember it differently, so the story constantly changes. 

*****

I published this story in this newsletter in 2020. Back then, my father would Facetime me about once a week, and I could tell when he had a rough day which was the delicate way I would describe his illness. Those rough-day conversations would usually go something like this:

"Did you try to call us? The phone is screwed up," he said. 

Half of his face would be shaved, and the other half was dotted with patches of uneven gray stubble. There was a blankness there, a pinched frustration because he knew something was wrong, but the problem escaped him.

He would quickly change the topic and ask if I needed anything. He would offer to send me money for my kids, which I'd sometimes take because I knew it made him feel good, even though he'd forget the conversation the next day. Two years ago, we were still talking on the phone. Two years ago, he still had his own phone. Two years ago, he still knew who I was half the time. 

This is the fifth Father’s Day n a row I’ve tried to rewrite the story of my father and my grandfather and Alzheimer's and fatherhood and "Chicken Soup for the Golfer's Soul.” I will probably write about it again next year because I always remember parts of it differently, so the story constantly changes. 

And I never thought I'd say this because it was usually so frustrating to play golf with him, but I have changed, and so has he, so here we are: I'm sad we won't play together again.