Adventures in Golf Employment (or lack thereof)

I was getting a little tired of titling my posts with Part III, IV, LXVIIXIVIXXXI (totally a real roman numeral...) because it was beginning to feel uncreative and lame. So this is a continuation of my "Last 1.5 Years" story, but with a more fun title. Woohoo!


So I was a tiny bit thinner and a whole lot more confident. I was ready to conquer my final interview with the PGA Tour and accept a full-time media position. I felt like hot stuff. Recession shmecession! I can get a job in any climate! Any state! Worthless degree who? Majoring in film is a slam dunk!

The job I was up for was the position of footage logger, which essentially means I would watch 8 hours of golf every day and then type up a frame-by-frame account of what happened. Why yes, it does sound like the most boring job ever. However, it paid money, offered benefits and when people asked where I worked I could say, "Oh you know.. PGA Tour. You may have heard of it. Or golfed before in your life." I certainly had not... and interviewing for a job that revolves around golf made me sweat in weird places.

You see, I know nothing about golf. I have played it zero times and the thought of watching someone play it makes me fall into a coma. All I know is that it's the one sport where points are bad. I have a hilarious joke on retainer for any time I'm playing Boggle and my opponent is losing. "Hey!" I say, "If this was golf, you'd be dominating!" Then I laugh like a comedy genius.Thinking about my interview, I was nervous that I would be asked many golf-related questions or, even worse, someone would try to have a friendly chat with me about a specific golfer. For example:

Friendly person: So did you see how Mansy Pansy Pie played last week?
Asia: Most definitely, good sir! Mr. Pansy Pie put on quite the display with his club and many-dimpled ball.
Friendly person: You are a sham.

As preparation for my interview, I researched "golf" on Wikipedia and realized just how complicated and over-my-head it really is. I looked up golf vocab words like "fairway" and "bogie" and tried to memorize who the good golfers were. I knew if I mentioned Tiger Woods they would know that I was a novice so I had to dig deeper. (Obviously I forgot them all immediately. Hence the Mansy Pansy Pie reference...)

Armed with a random smattering of golf information and a great attitude, I headed out to my interview.

The PGA Tour is mostly headquartered in a large complex called World Golf Village, full of fancy hotels and buildings sprawled over golf-course looking grass and shady areas. (Shady like lots-of-trees, not like you-might-get-murdered.) The funny thing about World Golf Village is that it was built when the economy was booming and it's obvious they planned for a lot of expansion. But when money got tight, plans to expand kind of withered, leaving a huge, beautiful complex in the middle of nowhere. Driving down International Golf Parkway, you'll pass way more tiny farms and pastures than you will Radissons. But I bet those farmers sure feel fancy telling people they live on International Golf Parkway.

I walked in and met my potential employer. I just remembered that his name was maybe Zach. He gave me a tour and introduced me to who my coworkers would be. They were mostly boys around my age. He showed we where my computer would be. It was basically a done deal!

After our tour, we went back to his office to discuss details. This is where my employment train derailed.

You see, golf is a game that people play on weekends, mostly. So people who work in the golf industry have to work a lot of Sundays. As part of my Mormon religion, I take the Sabbath day very seriously and try to never shop or work on Sundays. As maybe-Zach was asking me if I would be comfortable working weekends, I flashed him my biggest smile. "I would be happy to work every Saturday! But, unfortunately, because of religious commitments I've made, I can't work on Sundays." He looked very confused. "Everyone works on Sundays."

My employment confidence was shrinking quickly, but my spiritual confidence did not waver. "I'm sorry I can't." He nodded his head solemnly and said, "Well, that's a bummer."

And that was it. I didn't get the job. He was kind and courteous and showed me to the door. Part of me was disappointed, but another part of me felt amazing. I had just turned down an amazing opportunity because of my commitment to keeping God's commandments! I'm going to get so many blessings! I'll probably work for somewhere even better! Like Working Title Films or Oprah's new network! World, here I come! I've got the Lord on my side!

Literally... these were my thoughts. And while I definitely did have Heavenly Father on my side and I'm sure He was proud of me for sticking to my guns, the blessings He had in mind were much different than the blessings I had in mind.

Then somehow I ended up working in a bar.