What I Learned Planning a Golf Tournament as a Non-Golfer
I know nothing about golf. I knew nothing about golf last year when we decided that, just months into revitalizing the Perryville High School Alumni Association, putting on a Homecoming golf tournament sounded like a great idea. And now, as we prepare to launch our second annual tournament, I'm not sure I know that much more. I can build the registration page and make a spreadsheet or two, but at the end of the day I'm still liable to ask, "Remind me... What's a mulligan?"
Looking back, though, what I learned from that first tournament really didn't have much to do with golf at all. It taught me something about people, community, and what it actually looks like to create a tradition from scratch.
This homecoming will be our first full year as a revitalized Alumni Association board. A year ago, we were still finding our footing, learning each other's strengths, and discovering just how quickly a good idea can turn into a very long to-do list. Planning that tournament gave me a front-row seat to what happens when a group of people puts their minds together and decides they're going to make something happen. Meetings turned into action, and suddenly everyone was moving in this unsynchronized dance that somehow felt beautifully hectic. "I'll do the flyer." "I'll contact the club." "Did you order the souvenirs?" "Who has the signs?" "Let's add a drone drop!" Our group text was constantly buzzing, and I found myself admiring what the women of your Alumni Association board were accomplishing. Everyone found a piece of the puzzle and got to work.
There was stress, of course. That's part of putting on anything worthwhile. But I remember thinking that this particular stress felt different. It was stress with meaning, so to speak. Every phone call, spreadsheet, sponsor, registration, last-minute question, and forgotten detail was moving us toward something we believed could be good for our alumni and our community. My goal was to streaming transactions, but for the real golfing questions, I wisely leaned on people who knew the difference between a mulligan and whatever else golfers apparently spend their mornings talking about.
Then came tournament day, and that's when everything changed for me.
It was a crisp Homecoming morning, and Pirate after Pirate started coming in. People grabbed coffee, found their teams, said hello to old friends, and stood around talking and laughing before heading out. There was green and white everywhere. So much green and white. So much pride. After weeks of concentrating on details, suddenly I wasn't thinking about registrations or spreadsheets or whether we remembered everything. I was looking around at alumni, friends, community members, business partners, and supporters gathered together because of something that had existed only as an idea a few months earlier.
That's the memory that has stuck with me.
Now, a year later, we are getting ready to do it again, and I find myself feeling incredibly proud that we get to put the words "Second Annual" in front of the PHS Alumni Homecoming Golf Tournament. It's only two words, but they mean something. Last year we held an event. This year, we're beginning to build a tradition.
Traditions have to start somewhere. The things we associate with Homecoming and with being a Pirate didn't simply appear one day as longstanding traditions. Someone had an idea. Someone else volunteered to help. Somebody donated something, somebody made a phone call, somebody invited a friend, and eventually people showed up. Then they showed up again the next year. And the next. Somewhere along the way, an event became something people simply knew was what we do.
I'm proud to have played even a small part in starting something that I hope future generations of Pirates will continue long after our current board is gone. I'm incredibly proud of our board and the work they put in, but I'm equally proud of the community that embraced us. Local businesses and community partners supported an Alumni Association that was just getting back on its feet. Golfers signed up for a first-year event without knowing exactly what to expect. Volunteers gave their time. People offered advice, donated, sponsored, shared our posts, and helped wherever they could. Our school gave us something worth rallying around, and our community reminded us just how much green and white pride still exists beyond the walls of PHS.
That's probably the biggest thing I learned as a non-golfer planning a golf tournament: the golf was almost beside the point. It gave us a reason to gather, but what happened around it was what mattered. Old friends reconnected. New relationships were made. Our community supported our school. Pirates came home. And together, almost without realizing it, we planted the seed of a new Homecoming tradition.
As we launch year two, that's what excites me most. I hope someday nobody remembers that there was ever a time when the Alumni Homecoming Golf Tournament wasn't part of Homecoming week. I hope teams make it an annual reunion. I hope our business partners continue to see it as something worth supporting. I hope future Alumni Association boards inherit it, put their own stamp on it, and wonder why we ever did things the way we did in the early years.
Most of all, I hope we never lose sight of what makes traditions possible in the first place: people who care enough to participate.
So here's to year two. Here's to our board, our school, our alumni, our businesses, our community, and everyone who helped turn an idea into something worth doing again.
Here's to building traditions together.
And if someone wants to explain a mulligan to me before October, I'm still listening.
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