Jack Duff Junior

Asshole or not, I guess Adam was a friend. But a best friend? Would a best friend betray you?

Well, actually…who else would betray you? I was betrayed by a complete and utter stranger! Doesn’t have the same ring of truth to it.

So then, perhaps Adam 'Thee' King was a best friend. I was a best friend of his. One of thousands. Was he my best friend? Did he in fact betray me? Is it a betrayal to withold from a friend the truth?

These questions may all sound rather vague and juvenile. But let’s face it. I'm a golf professional. And an American male. I am entitled to be forever young and fuzzyheaded.

Still, for the past ten years I have held firm in my head the notion that Adam 'Thee' King betrayed me. And now I'm wondering…if as I have claimed earlier - that he was not my best friend - then he could hardly betray me, could he? And the impetus for writing this memoir would suddenly dissolve. I would have no purpose. But as you can see by the book you are holding, I have in fact continued, and so it's safe to assume that Adam 'Thee' King will be seen over the next few pages to turn out, indeed, to be NOT my best friend.

I'm sorry to confuse you on this point. I'm confused myself. But as I say life is a mess.

And there's was no point messier in my whole existence than the hours and days following my collapse in the Galapagos.

After leaving Gaston on the tarmac I headed into the house for a good long soak in the Jacuzzi. For some reason unknown to me to this day, I decided to flip on the television hanging from the ceiling in our ensuite. There was a tape delay version of The OilCo on TAFT2. For some reason I decided to watch it.

I never watch golf. I never watch myself playing golf. Golf is my profession. It's my job. And though I've always taken it - the game, the job - seriously I have never been much of a student of the game. Or, rather, I've never been much of a mechanist, never one to spend hours on the practise range pounding balls, and certianly never one to sit down with video equipment and analyze my swing.

My swing is completely natural.

It seems I was given three gifts in life one of which is a perfectly balanced, fluid, athletic Natural Golf Swing. (The other two gifts being my ExtraMental Powers which I have already alluded to, and the third, my World Historical Penis. More on that later.) And so when one of either of the two nearly indistinguishable TAFT TV golf announcers - Guy Stump and/or Guy Twaddle - began enumerating the fine aspects of my ideal swing - "any kids watching should really try to copy this swing" - I sank below the surface of the water. In avoidance. Not only was I slightly superstitious about listening to Stump and or Twaddle going on about my swing, avoiding them, I was avoiding the sounds my wife Babs was making, just having arrived home herself from yet another unsuccessful week on the Lesbian Tour.

It's funny, the routine in a house occupied by two professional golfers. Tuesday and Wednesdays can be hectic and exciting if a little nerve-racking- the anticipation and nervousness, the hope, the laundry, the packing and repacking of the luggage and the golf bag, the start of another week. Sunday nights are more often than not deeply, deeply depressing. Wins on any golf Tour are few and far between. In some ways it's often better to miss the cut and make it home on a Friday night, at least you can make some plans for the weekend, knowing that you were completely off your game, that you were so awful that there's nothing to do but shrug and laugh at yourself, have a few beers, catch up with some friends or family, see a movie - whatever. But arriving home on a Sunday means yet another loss. No matter how far back you were beginning Saturday morning's third round, there was still a glimmer of hope. A pair of 64s just might see you in the clubhouse early Sunday afternoon, with the lead, and some ominous clouds on the horizon, omens for the late starters atop the leaderboard. And that for the past three or four years had been Babs' fate. Week after week, month after month, there she was, her short fat stupid self plodding along, up and down the fairways in those dopey culottes, struggling gracelessly, in and out of bunkers like a toddler climbing around on the rec room furniture, playing just well enough to make the cut, and then disappointing herself and her fans - both of them - with a pair of abysmal rounds, totals in the 160 range on average.

And so I sunk my head under the water of the hot tub. I really didn’t want to hear her banging around, banging her keys down on the dining room table, dropping her luggage on the tiles of the front hallway, sighing, slamming doors - generally making a fuss.

Can you tell I didn’t like her? Does it show?

Like is not a word one associates with Babs-Dawn Huff-Duff. She is not a likeable person. I know, I tried. Even her parents would tell you that. I married her not out of love, but…well…for convenience. Her parents were loaded. They liked me. I needed a stake. They wanted her and her temper out of the house, out of the way, away from the good china. Ours was for all intents and purposes a decent business proposition, an arranged marriage. We were the typical American couple.

On the up side, Babs filled a void in my life. Quite adequately. As the years past, she grew in that role. The void was more than full. The sides were overflowing. And there came a point. Some men want their space. I wanted my void.

The two principal emotions I felt for her then, safe to say, were hate and fear. And so I sank myself under the turbulent waters.

Not only was I avoiding her I was avoiding the voice of objective praise booming from the speakers of TV. I was avoiding the voice of Guy Stump or Guy Twaddle.

"…everything is nice and square. Like a good meal. His weight distributed equally between both of his feet. The ball is just inside of his left heel, and the left foot is just slightly open to the target. His grip’s neutral. That allows his hands to remain passive, quiet, throughout the entire swing. Now, he takes the club back low and in one piece, with a nice shoulder turn, Now look at this - hold it there - at the top of the backswing his wrists cock naturally, the shaft is pointing directly down the target line, just a touch short of parallel, his left shoulder tucked in nicely below his chin, ninety degrees to the target. At this point his weight is about seventy five per cent on his right foot, and there’s good tension created here, loaded into his knee and thigh area, that’s where he gets all that power with such an easy swing, Now he starts the downswing, drops the club into the slot, comes into the hitting area and bam, releases the right side, clears the hips, and chases the ball toward the target with the club head, and that is the key to his accuracy, chases the ball to the target, with a nice high follow through, facing the target, in balance. Simple."

I emerged with an ear toward the house. There was a final thump. Her bedroom door. Boom. Followed by some muffled wailing as she threw her plump freckled face into her pillow no doubt. I know. That's her routine.

"Now here’s Jack Duff live with his three foot birdie attempt on fifteen" said Guy Stump.

My attention was drawn to the screen above. There I was. Standing over a putt. I didn't recognize myself. Yes, it was me. Shorn headed and dressed in my Sunday black.

I missed the putt. A three foot putt. I couldn’t believe it. And I had been there. When I was there, hours before, I thought that putt was more like ten, twelve feet. But the camera doesn't lie. I was shocked by my own inelegance.


"I’ll tell you, Guy. Everything in this putting stroke is the mirror opposite of his full swing. Watch. Now, he should take the putter back low along the putting surface, but instead he kind of lifts it straight up in the air, and then makes an awkward ...stab at the ball, cutting across the line of the putt. He sort of begins to push the putt, and his mind is saying ‘you’re pushing it, Jack’ and then he closes the putter face, over-compensating and yanks it left. A jerky, hurried, brutal stroke. There’s about ten different things wrong with that stroke, Guy, and if the ball was going in the hole it wouldn’t matter, but as anyone can see there, the ball doesn’t even get a sniff. I mean that’s just downright painful to watch."

Guy was right.

Despite the pain I continued to watch the telecast. I was now tied with Adam for the lead. He had just finished up his round, playing a few holes ahead of me. And he had done so in style apparently and was now in the booth on eighteen basking in the glory of a course record fifty-nine. A 59!

No wonder he was so ebullient on the flight home. I hadn’t realized he'd played that well. For a moment I felt slightly less horrible about myself and my play. For a moment.

But only a moment. Like that moment in a game of chess when you capture your opponent's queen with your rook, a moment of quiet consolation, the brief pause before your opponent then slides his bishop along the newly free corridor and utters the words checkmate.

"Tell us about that amazing approach shot on eighteen, Your Highness"

"Well Guys, apart from my own physical capabilities in pulling off a shot like that, I’d like to think that the technology played a role."

"The two and a half wood?"

"Yeah, it’s the first time I’ve used it in sanctioned tournament play. There’s a special titanium insert in the face of the club, with dove-tailed grooves."

"Dove tailed grooves as opposed to the square grooves?"

"That's right. I won’t go into the details here and now, but I will be explaining it all in my next televised info-special."

"And, just a reminder to our viewers, that info-special will be seen on TAFT TV."

"That’s right, Guy. It's scheduled to run on TAFT two weeks from now, the day of the final round of the Bingham Meats Machu Pichu Classic, in the hour preceding the golf telecast for those east of the meridian to the international date line, and following the telecast for those west of the meridian. It should be a lot of fun. We’ll explain the thinking behind the dove-tailed grooves and have a few song and dance numbers as well."

Adam was yakking away as I stood, on screen, over another three foot par putt, this time on seventeen. Stump and Twaddle were oblivious to the fact that I was still on the course, never mind on the television screens of millions worldwide, still tied for the lead. They were fucking well, in spirit, conceding the tournament to Adam. The voice of his self promotion was running over my fucking agony.

If I was paranoid I would have thought it was a conspiracy.

There I was bent over my golf ball like a spastic mental case up from the wheel chair for the first time in fifty years, all bent out of shape, pigeon toed and shaking. A close up revealed that my hands were shaking! On top of that I was muttering to myself and twitching.

Muttering. Who knew? Not me.

Of course the putt stopped a half roll short and to the right of the cup. I walked up to the ball and knocked it in nonchalantly with one hand. I picked the ball out of the hole and walked off the green waving to the gallery like nothing out of the ordinary had happened. As if I had saved par. As if I was walking to the next tee with a chance to stroll up eighteen with the winner's cheque already in my back pocket.

"Here it is again, Guy. At regular speed. Jack stands over the ball for at least fifteen or twenty seconds, I mean this is a straight forward putt, straight in, nothing complicated, don’t give the hole away, hit it firm...but it’s like Jack’s frozen. And then. And then this...oh dear me."

Then came the coup de grace. I think that's the term. Off with your head, Duff, my friend. The coup de grace a la King.

"Adam, what’s up with that?"

"Jack's putting? Well Guys, let me just say Jack is one of my best friends, and I love him dearly, and I would never tell him this, but I think he's got the yips."

I would never tell him this, but I think he's got the yips.

I was once playing touch football with my father. He pushed me to the ground with a little too much force and I landed on the ball. The wind was knocked out of me. I couldn't breathe. I thought I was going to die. I thought I would never breathe again.

That's how I felt when I heard Adam utter those words.

The yips.

Hey Casanova, you've got AIDS.

Suck it up son, you’re just winded.

"Well, thanks for coming along today Thee and congratulations again on Thy fifty nine,"

"Well, with any luck out there I could have been a fifty-six. I lipped out a seventy-five foot putt on three; my approach on six - a 210 lob wedge hit the stick but it just didn’t drop; and my fairway sand shot from 333 on nine, just stopped short of the hole, maybe a half roll or quarter roll from going in. Really I should have been a 28 on the front. With the 28 on the back, there would have been a certain symmetry in that I suppose, but hey, that’s golf for you."

Let me be upfront about this out of the blocks. There is vanity at work here.

I have been inspired to write this memoir - call it a rationalization of my life, or a justification of my existence, or a revisionist biography for all I care - after seeing on the tube some weeks ago, my name referenced in a… how shall I put this?…well, in a not so flattering manner.

Bluntly put, I was the answer to a trivia question.

I was not put on this fucking blue and green orb floating in space with no beginning and with no end to become a footnote in the annals of modern golf.

Let me back up a bit. To the some weeks ago part. To the more current history of my life.

I am the resident golf professional here on the Isles of Fair Eiron, an archipelago of greensward as the brochures put it, here where the North Sea and the Gulfstream intersect. I have been living on these islands since late 1996 after my plane ran out of fuel and crashed on the par five fifth fairway of the South Course, the hole the locals know as Oblivion. I had just won the General Weapons World Association of Golf Championship in Australia and I was flying solo to Sweden in order to at once reclaim my infant son from and to bed the woman who was taking care of him, my then newly dead ex-wife's lesbian lover Inga Bjornson.

Okay that sounds rather complicated but it’s not really. It made sense at the time. And made quite a stir in the tabloid press and on exploitative television programs. But as it is with these things over time, the shock value wanes and the narrative does not sustain. So, if you can’t recall or weren't paying attention then, never fear. All will be laid out in due course, with a view toward clarity. Yes life is mess but it does make sense if you don't think about it.

Anyway getting back to a few weeks ago.

I was sitting here in the clubhouse catching up on some paperwork of an early Sunday evening. There were a couple of patrons at the bar - Sean Connery and Nick Faldo - watching the final round of the OilCo Blue Lagoon Billion Dollar Blowout being played over The Blue Booby down in the Galapagos Islands. I wasn't paying much attention, really. Despite the fact that the Galapagos was one of my favorite stops when I played on the World Tour. A real pretty place, much nicer now I hear, since they finally got rid of all those damn cormorants and fucking penquins shitting all over the greens.

"In 1996, which former World Association of Golf member, blew a nine shot lead in the final round of that year's OilCo Blue Lagoon Billion Dollar Blowout. Here's a hint. Adam 'Thee' King was the eventual winner. The answer right after a few words from Arnold B Sawgrass, CEO of OilCo."

The guys at the bar glanced my way. I kept my head down, pretending to be oblivious.

"Hey, Jacko. They're bringing up that fiasco again." The pair chuckled in their pints. Normally I'd tell them to fuck off, you know, in that jocular familiar sort of way. But I just raised a hand, like I didn’t care. I'd endured worse ribbing. From greater souls than those two fucks I might add.

Over the years I've glanced rather disinterestedly at a fair bit of WAG golf. And it hasn't bothered me either way. There's never been a sense of loss, or an overwhelming sense of nostalgia. No longing to return to what once was.

But in this instance, on hearing the voice of the very familiar TAFT TV announcer Guy Stump, something did rub me the wrong way. Something was being stirred up inside. My memories of the event, the external stimuli, the sights, the sounds the smells, - the roiling blue Pacific, the polite yet enthusiastic gallery twenty five thousand strong, the fragrance of marinated tortoise wafting over the course from the grill room at the Beagle Bar - you know, that shit - was presently being tempered by some deep slow psychic heat or was being tampered with by some immovable ineluctable spirit. In other words my body was fucking with my mind. Or vice versa. My nerve endings were now complementing the empirical remembrances I was holding in my brain, a faint minor chord reverberating over a series of sweet still photos.

It was the answer to that trivia question that cemented it for me, like a great big boot in the balls.

"Which WAG pro blew a nine shot lead in 1996 eventually losing to his chief rival, next door neighbour and best friend Adam 'Thee' King. The answer: the late Jack Duff Jr."

And it wasn't 'the late' part that got my bag in a knot, either. That I've all along accepted. That the world presumes me to be dead is fine by me as I am physically grounded in a place of complete resignation. And I mean that literally. Not metaphorically. Here on Fair Eiron acceptance is a way of life. And, frankly, I wouldn’t have it any other way. Even though the publication of this memoir will cause some sensation, cause some attention to come my way, cause a few pounds to flow into the kitty - that's not my reason for doing this. Jack Duff Jr. Back From the Dead! The Dead tells All! To cause a brief sensation. To scream Hey look at me! No no no. That's not my purpose.

The part that bugged me, the part that has incited this memoir, this recollection of my life, this reordering of the details, were the words 'best friend'. There's the rub. That is the impetus.

Adam Thee King was my best friend? Ha!

Let me set you straight on that. Adam 'Thee' King was, is, and always will be a fucking cocksucker. Adam King was never my best friend. I wish the man no ill by saying any of this either. He's just another cunt.

Let me give you a for instance going back to that time, that very day in 1996.

I was standing over a putt on the eighteenth green. My lead had already evaporated and I had already lost the tournament. I was left with a final three foot putt to close out the day with a 79, which would have left me well back in a tie for fifth. I was the last player on the course having been in the final group of the day. Even my playing partner Moses Bunt was in the press tent profusely thanking Jesus Christ for the good fortune He had bestowed upon his fat self that day.

A three foot putt.

I clearly remember standing over the putt. I'd looked at it from all angles. It was a simple putt straight up the hill. I knew the line.

"C'mon Jack, hit the putt, mate. We gotta going. Rumpole's on at 9." Adam began poking me in the ass with the flagstick. I never did pull the trigger. I never did hit that putt. I never did finish the round. I was DQ'd. Adam finally picked up my ball and led me by the elbow off the green. The sun had set. The stands were empty.

That evening, we flew home to the States in Adam's plane. Mine was in the shop for repairs.

I sat in silence in the co-pilots seat for the first two hours. Well, not in complete silence. In my headset I was listening to some Tibetan Buddhist chants. I was silent. I said nothing. I didn't really feel like talking much. And with Adam about there was never much need to do any amount of talking.

He was in his own state of euphoria, a high borne of his inflated ego, and yet another win, the year's first. No concern for me. No concern that I might be suffering.

"You know Jack I constantly amaze myself. Just when I think I've done it all I manage to top my self. You know, some day I'm going to write a book about myself. On second thought a book wouldn't do my life justice. I'm going straight to film with it. I can see it. It’s laid out like a symphony on the back of my forehead. All in one piece. A masterpiece. The only problem is there may be no ending. Just when I come to what I think is a climax I do something bigger and better and more amazing. And yet, Jack, I remain relatively normal."

"Adam, you're hardly normal. You're one of the wealthiest men alive. You're married to a former Miss Mulatto Universe. You've got twelve beautiful children. You live in a sixteenth century palace that has been disassembled and relocated to an ideal climate - I mean you're the King of the World."

"No, I'm not the King of the World, Jack I'm the King of England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland" (Adam had purchased the Crown in 1994 from the House of Windsocks as he liked to call them for an undisclosed sum.) "And I don't have everything as you say. Not yet. I don't win every golf tournament. Sometimes I come in second, sometimes third. But I keep smiling. You should try that sometime Jack, Smiling. You think you smile but you don't really. You smirk. See. You're smirking now. Then you fold your arms and you look away. See. Just like that. You smirk, fold your arms, and then look away. Then you snort. See. You just snorted. See Jack, I know you better than you know yourself. You think you know yourself. But you don't. I know you better than you know yourself."

Allright so perhaps that's not how the conversation went. Exactly. And is that my for instance? That Adam 'Thee' King is a cunt because he's an out of control raging egomaniac who has the gall to presume that he knows me better than I know myself? No.

Or rather, partially.

We deplaned on the shared runway that separated our residences in Safehaven, Arizona. Adam's footman Gaston was there to help remove our bags from the cargo bay. He handed Adam his phone messages.

"Bob Hope called?" asked Adam, as if Bob Hope had never called him before. As if Bob Hope wasn't one of his best friends. "Fantastic. What'd did he want?"

"Merely offering his congratulations on your tremendous come from behind victory today... I believe, sire," Gaston gave me a sly sideways glance as he slid melodioulsy over the words 'come from behind' and then bowed demurely. That was the thing about Gaston. I was never sure if his gentlemanly manner was a put on or what. I mean here you have this older black guy - easily in his sixties, fit and wrinkled, with a distinquished calm about his head, with a bit of a French patois thing going for him, a bit of education obviously, from where who knows - who knows where people come from, who knows what sort of background they have anymore - and there he is in white linens right down to the white linen gloves taking this service thing a bit far as far as I was concerned. He bowed again after Adam barked some instructions regarding the returning cargo - his clubs, his laundry, his catch of Lake Titicaca gnu. Adam's tone was officious, not cruel, granted, but still, I don't know, harsh. Adam barked further orders to Gaston about my stuff, turned on his heel and headed for the main house.

"See you in the morning Jack? Come over and hit some balls."

I said yeah okay as I wasn't sure what I had on the menu for the next day. Never did. I was always one to live in the moment. Not much on plans. Some might say I was a bit spacey. Out there. Some found this aspect of my personality charming; others, like my fat short stupid wife, it drove mad. Me? I'd given up kicking myself over it long before. And it was about to serve me well in the coming months, along The Path to Enlightenment.

I tried to give Gaston a hand unloading my stuff from the plane but he'd have none of it.

"You may if you wish go ahead to your house, Mr. Duff. I will bring your things along presently."

"Gaston, can I ask you a question?"

"Yes, Mr. Duff?"

"Gaston, you’ve worked for Adam for several years now. I’m not sure how to ask this but well, don’t you find him to be a bit hard - on you - at times?"

"Mister Duff, I’m afraid I am finding myself inclined toward the dissuasion of your entreaties at this moment. To engage in conversations of this nature, well, it goes against the grain of my conscience. His majesty is my employer, yes, you are correct in that assumption. But I have pledged to him my allegiance and fealty and so therefore I am his devoted and silent servant. To wit, to become involved in conversations of this nature would be to betray a trust. You ask me ‘is he hard', a seemingly innocent question. Ha! Questions of a more diabolical nature are asked of me routinely by the tabloid media. Monies have been offered. Sums dozens of times larger than my yearly income. Cash for my socalled insights into the goings-on of the household. Sir, I do not trade in gossip. It would, I believe, undermine the stability of the monarchy."

"Gaston. I was just wondering if he was a bit hard on you, the way he orders you about."

"That is my job."

"Your job is to haul luggage, fold underwear, answer the door, not to be treated like dirt."

Gaston took a step back. His entire body, once athletic, utilitarian, was quivering in anger.

"Why do you find it necessary to humiliate me like this Mr. Duff."

"Gaston, it was never my intention..."

"To remind me of my shame? That I am not a professional golfer?"

"Gaston, I’m sorry."

"You are rubbing my nose in it like a dog. From His Highness, I take it, but from you I do not. Now, if you would be so kind as to excuse me Mr Duff I will take my leave."

"You don’t need my permission, Gaston."

Gaston stood motionless, making his point.

"Mr. Duff, you are making this very difficult."

"Gaston I just wanted to know if you found him a bit harsh at times, that’s all."

"You would like me to confirm what I suspect you already know. Will that please you then? If I answer your question? Very well, then. Yes, His Majesty is a hard man. His Majesty is, in a word, a prick. Worse, His Majesty regularly beats Her Highness the Queen. His Majesty buggers the kitchen staff at will, and has deflowered each of the several virgin nannies who have been employed in the House. His Majesty tortures the Corgis. And for those unfortunate souls who dare stand in his way, His Majesty has, in the past, had them executed. Royally, as they say. There you have it. That is all I am going to say."

I was stunned by these revelations. I'd known Adam for years and had always suspected a dark side, a morass, a knot of deceit, some sadness behind that ever present smile, but never had I suspected this sort of thing. I was nonplussed.

"You’re kidding?" These were the only words I could manage.

Gaston exploded: "Of course I am kidding! Adam "The" King is the greatest human being I have ever served. His Majesty is hard on me and I accept that because it is my role. I am his valet. I act and dress and talk like a valet. I know my place. And I would have thought that you, by now, would have known your place at court. In your position as consort to ‘The’ King, it is your privilege, your responsibility -"

"My place at court? This isn’t medieval Europe. This is America. We’re all equal, Gaston."

"Equal? We are all cards in the deck, yes, but we have different value. I am but a two of cups to the King of Hearts. "

"And what am I? The Jack of Spades."

"Jack of Spades? Ha! No. You flatter yourself. Jack of Clubs, perhaps. But you have no clubs, it would appear."

Gaston handed me a clipboard with the airplane's shipping manifest, an itemized log of the cargo that had left the Galapagos some four hours prior. My clubs never made the trip.

"You have left them in the Galapagos. Like a Fool. Yes, that’s it, You are The Fool. The Joker. The Clown. Now if you would be so kind, I have work to do."

So there I was making presumptions about Gaston much the same way Adam had made and would continue to make presumptions about me.

'You should smile more often Jack. Be more like me.'

I was being more like him. I was being a complete fucking asshole. But that's on me. No need to be a fucking asshole like him. I could be a fucking asshole in my own right.

Adam with his big sunny disposition was not just the center of the world, he was the centre of the universe. His ego was not of this world. As his golf game was beyond superstar status, his ego was beyond the superego. His ego was positively helio. His children were the planets. His wife was Mother Earth upon whom he shone his love daily. I suppose I was the moon. I should have been happy with that. And I suppose I was.

But the metaphor doesn't hold. Nothing is permanent.

Life is a mess.

None more so than my very public life that ended some ten years ago. My very private life since has been a mess as well. But much less intriguing than the life I led as one of the world's best professional golfers and a leading light in the realm of the spiritual arts.

Now, that life, the life of Jack Duff Jr, the sweet swinging Americam Tibetan Buddhist monk and ersatz world Number One golf pro, was a real mess. Or looking back now from the comfort of my new digs here on the Isles of Fair Eiron and the relative stability of this my new life, that life was a very unreal mess.

My life was half-dream half-nightmare. Full of success, love, women, money, women, golf, women, adoring fans, adoring women, golf trophies, trophy women. You'll notice I mention women more than once. Well it did seem to be the ruling theme of my life, then. Not now.

Now, in my quasi-post-Enlightenment years, - let’s call them that for lack of a better phrase - women are few and far between. I haven’t the time. Or the inclination. Or the energy. Or the desire.

Desire I have in abundance, but not for women. Or men, let me be clear about that.

My main desire in life is to clean up the mess that is my past, that cyclonic life of mine which swirled across the globe.

And, as well, I have to admit, there is a strong desire on my part to clean up my reputation, that which remains of me, outside of me, over which I have no control. My legacy if you will.

I left the world of golf on top. As the disputed world number one. Yes, disputed. Normally these things are undisputed, Or inarguable. In my case my rank as the world's best golfer in the year 1996 was in dispute and that fact I do not dispute. In fact I could care less. Or is it 'couldn’t care less'. I'm never sure which. Either way. Whatever. You get the drift.

No, what I would like to clear up are some of the facts and details concerning my life in that year, the year 1996, wherein I reclaimed the title of world number one - or didn't. Again I don't care. Really I don't.

It was quite a year. The culmination of quite a life. My apparent death. Which is, as you may guess, in dispute. The untimely death of my wife. The insinuation on a near global scale that I, Jack Duff Jr., dog that I am, somehow had a hand in her death. Or more to the point, had put my mind to it, to her death, that I had somehow used my ExtraMental powers - my gift - to destroy her and to end her life ignomoniously as they say. I mean, give me a break. Just because I can control a golf ball - bending it midflight, first left then right, drawing and then fading it with just one swing of the club - unlike any golfer in the history of the game, I might add - does not mean that I can manipulate the mind of another human being. Even be it a woman. My overwhelming Extra Mental powers of seduction notwithstanding.

Okay, yes, there is something very special about my brain. Yes I have Extra Mental powers. But would I ever use these Extra Mental powers for evil, to commit an act of murder, essentially to drive a woman, my wife, the mother of my only child, to drive her to her death?

I am not evil.

Unless of course you deem 'sleeping with' thousands of women to be an evil act. Or you see devotion to the American Tibetan Buddhist Way as some sort of evil subterfuge against the God in which we emboss on copper. Or you see the World Professional Golf Association as evil, its members' partners' and sponsors' activities as some kind of global hyper-capitalist conspiracy… then you have made up your mind already and you may as well just fuck right off now.

Murder my wife? No.

And you know what? If I could have contrived that day where her head was crushed on live television the way it was I would have. I'll even admit that against my lawyer's advice and my own better judgment. Babs Dawn Huff-Duff? I wasn't really a fan. But I couldn't despite my wishes hopes dreams and prayers will her death. Sure I muttered on more than one occasion 'I wish you were dead.' But so what? Who hasn’t said that? Man or woman. Or thought that, at least. Or fantasized about another life, a life without their dearly betrothed. A life with someone else. A life different.

But the problem with these alternative lives, these fanatsies and romantic fabrications is not the immorality of it all, it is the delusion. Somehow, this different life is always a better life. Isn’t that always the case? As if there is no chance that your fantasy life would ever turn out to be worse than the pathetic existence you find yourself barely enduring at this moment.

Yeah. The Buddhists are always going on about life being an illusion. Which is true. On the surface. But I'd trump that and make the claim that the interior life of man is to a large degree a dee-lusion.

Now, my declamation may come off sounding a tad arrogant or pompous, but hey, let's face facts. I can still lay claim to the fact that besides being once - no wait, twice - the world's best professional golfer I also attained a state of Supreme and Exhalted Enlightnenment by following the eightfold path of the American Tibetan Buddhist Movement, Santa Clara California Chapter. I've got the plaque to prove it. Not that I want to rub that in your face or in the face of any former friends and teachers and posers and demi-rinpoches.

But…I've got dharma cred. I am in the Buddha loop.

And so, am I here, as a service to humankind, to lead The Way? No. For that you can buy my book, Golf My Middle Way: An Enlightened Approach to the Green, co-authored with the Wurlitzer Prize winning sportswriter and general scuzzball Grant Humboldt. There are tons of copies - literally tons - available on Amazon.

No, I'm here in a rare moment of seflishness. For a change. Not that I am tired of my selflessness. My holiness. Not by any means. No. I'm just here, down from my egoless state of being for a little look back into the Void that is - or was - my life.