The Kid Says You Owe Him

This little slip of land on the west coast of Scotland is where I’ve come to live, far from the past. It was my choice. I came here to get away, not run away, to settle into a life of retirement.

For so long I had moved on the wrong side of the law with a fair amount of success. Don’t misunderstand me; it wasn’t perfect run. I’ve spent plenty of time behind locked iron doors. I’m not missing three front teeth because of poor dental hygiene. I’ve been in my share of trouble, sometimes because I went looking for it and sometimes because it found me.

All in all, though, when I left, I figured I was ahead of the game, one of the few.

I didn’t tell anyone—not a soul—that I was done. I took my money, a few personal items and vanished in the dead of night without warning. I said no goodbyes. I left no forwarding address. Disappeared like a long putt into the hole. First I was there; then I wasn’t. The only sound that might have been heard was the click of my apartment door locking behind me.

I’ve been dreaming about Scotland it since I was 10. That’s when I caught my first images of the Open Championship at the Old Course in St. Andrews on my aunt’s television screen. That’s the summer I picked up a golf club for the first time. I was enamored with the game from the start. I knew, though, that I had never really played the golf the way it was intended, the way the Scots play it, and I had to before I died.

I came here to find refuge from my past, not just in an innocuous town, but also among the dunes, the hummocks and the hollows, and on the fairways and greens of true Scottish linksland course, this one designed, according to the members, by the divine hand of the Almighty at the inception of the Universe.

The town was all of 3,000 inhabitants, a metropolis in this part of the world. The next burg bigger than it was a two-hour car ride, much of it on single-track, pothole-infested roads.

Here, everyone was related to everyone and everyone knew everyone’s business. There were walls that I could never penetrate. That could work in my favor. It could be a problem.

If you weren’t born in this place, no matter how long you lived here, you were known as an “incomer.”

As one local told me, “you could be here for 84 years, moved to the town with your parents when you were a wee lad, been the mayor, a philanthropist and champion golfer, and at your funeral, the minister would still say make sure to say, ‘… our deceased friend, originally from Glasgow.”

Nevertheless, I was welcomed. I wasn’t the ugly American, nor was I a loner. I spent time in the pubs; in places like the Ailsa, and the Black Sheep and bought my share of pints for my new friends. I ate at the Harborview and sipped single malt at the Ardshiel. I did my serious drinking at the Redan, a 40-second walk from my front door.

I played my golf at Drumlemble Links, “The Drum,” to the members, of which I was one.

My flat was on a narrow street with the odd name of the Wide Close. On the bottom floor was a butcher and a few doors down was fishmonger and a fruitery. Not a bad location, at all.

One set of stairs led to the only door in or out of my place. I liked it that way. If they were coming, there was only one route to get to me. The third floor gave me a good view of the street below, without being easily seen.

I spent my days golfing and reading papers. I volunteered at the library and helped the local historical society catalogue its possessions… and I watched.

I wasn’t paranoid, but vigilant, like the crews of the small prawn fishing fleet that called the harbor home. No matter what the forecast said, they always paid attention the sky and the water, felt the air, listened to the wind. Like them, I didn’t know if trouble was on the way but I sure wasn’t going to be caught unaware or unprepared.